What If I'd Tried To Save You
by cutelilpuppieyez
Summary: It all started with a simple birthday wish, but then it got out of control...Shuichi finds himself in New York City, the day that Eiri was attacked by Kitazawa's friends. Will he be able to change what happened? Or were things better off before?
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **Hey guys, I never thought that I'd be writing again so quickly, but I just got this idea about a week after I finally finished Dire Consequences, and someone asked for a sequel, and I was like you know what would be cool? So I wanted to do a sequel to What If I Had Let You Go, but then I decided not to, but then when I started writing this, I decided that it was from the same sort of idea, so it is not the prequel, or the sequel, but the ... samequel...er, yes, that's my new word. So, you don't need to read the other story to understand this one, just read this and come to your own conclusions...

Just a note, the beginning part is written in present tense, so sorry about that, I know that I'm not too great at writing in it, I just thought that it would go well with the dream explanation. Besides that, it's in the regular past tense.

Okay, well the idea for this story came to me after watching my favourite movie, The Butterfly Effect, so if you've seen the movie, you'll definitely recognize the main idea.

**Warning: **Some mild boringness in the this chapter...the good stuff doesn't start til chapter two  but I really needed to have this here...I suppose it's not too tragic though (I hope)

Oh, and nothing to watch out for in this chapter...

**Disclaimer:** Gee whiz, I always forgot to tell people I don't own this, I really hope they don't think otherwise…

**Chapter One: A Prophetic Dream**

**Part One: A Party!**

Shuichi bolted upright in bed after his second nightmare that night. Fifth that week. And God knows how many that month. As usual, he's walking down a hallway; actually, the hallway in Eiri's apartment. At the end, he can hear the sounds of the writer clicking away at his laptop unceasingly, and so he goes towards it. He can't remember why he's looking for Eiri, but it seems important to talk to him. As he slowly opens the door to the office, cringing in expectation of the writer's anger, there's a glimpse of blond hair and a bright flash, and then suddenly, sitting in Eiri's chair, there's a strange man with brown hair.

"Hey Shuichi!" The man says, smiling as he closes the laptop, and stands up to greet him. "I've been waiting for you to get home, what do you feel like for supper?"

"Who...who are you?" He asks the man, in a frightened tone.

"Don't be silly Shuichi-kun!" The man giggles, and reaches to stroke a hand along his cheek, but he recoils, "Hey, what's the matter?"

"Where's Eiri?"

A look of confusion crosses the man's face as he contemplates the name. "Um, I don't know any Eiri…are you feeling okay?" He reaches out a hand again, but this time gets it slapped away.

"No, I want my—"

There's another bright flash, and then—

"—Eiri!" The blond writer looks up from the laptop.

"Are you still here?"

"Uh…ug….wha…?"

"If you're not going to say anything interesting, you can leave me alone," Eiri turns back to the computer, with a smirk on his face, "But if you make supper, without using the oven, I'll come join you…"

What the hell? Where'd that man gone? And now Eiri is back? But the offer sounds promising, so he heads off down the hallways towards the kitchen, but just as he passes the bathroom, there's another flash and—

"—And so what do you want to make for supper?" The brown haired man is back, walking beside him so closely that they brush shoulders, "How do you feel about…mmm…takeout," the man laughs, "I'm too lazy to make food…"

All he can manage is a frozen look at the man, before bolting back in the direction of Eiri's office. When he looks in the door, he sees, to his horror, that the blond man is gone, and he notices that Eiri's bookcase, and ashtray is gone. There is no trace of the writer in the room, save the laptop, which, on closer examination, looks different.

Suddenly, there's a hand on his shoulder. "Is something wrong Shuichi? What are you looking for?"

"Where's Eiri? He's not here! What did you do with him?"

"Shuichi, calm down, I don't know who you're talking about! Just don't—"

"My boyfriend! Where is he? I just saw him, a second ago! What the hell did you do with him?"

The brown haired man looks at him for a second, a look of realization dawning on his face. Then, unexpectedly, he laughs. "Oh, wow, you had me going there for a second Shuichi…wow, I thought for a second you were serious about having a boyfriend in our appartment, or something."

"Uh…_our_ appartment?"

"Um, yeah, at least, last time I checked…" The man slings a friendly arm over his shoulders, and attempts to nuzzle into his neck, but he rips himself away.

Running through the apartment, he sees no sign of Eiri ever being there. None of the empty beer cans, no ashtrays everywhere, no picture, no books scattered haphazardly across the table, no nothing. It's like he never existed.

And then he's on the floor, screaming to have Eiri back, when he wakes up.

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Shuichi fumbled around with the key of the apartment, trying to get it into the lock. Why was the hallway so dark? He groaned as the keys slipped through his fingers to the floor. This was just the kind of day that he'd had all day long at NG.

Once inside, it was still pitch-black. Shuichi peered around the corner of his apartment curiously. Why was it so dark in here? Straining his ears, he listened for the familiar clicks of Eiri at his laptop, but there weren't any sounds coming from the office. That was strange. And surprisingly unusual. Not qualities that Eiri displayed too often; something weird was going on.

Cautiously, he stepped into the living room, feeling along the wall for the light switch. The floor creaked ominously to his left, causing him to jump forwards, frantically fumbling for the switch. Monsters! There were monsters in here, and they'd eaten Eiri; that was the only explanation. No, he was too young to die! If only he could find the light switch, he could banish the monsters, and what else? What else did monsters not like?

He desperately scanned his memory, and came up with an answer. Finally finding the light switch, Shuichi kept a steady hand on it as he slowly pulled his water bottle out of his bag, turning to face the pitch black room. With a shout, he flung on the light switch, and in the moment of the bright flash, squirted the contents of his water bottle onto the monster.

"Take that you beast!" His eyes were squeezed tightly shut, in case the monster had special powers, like turning people into stone. But then he heard something that sounded strangely like laughter. Did monsters laugh? Deciding that it was okay to have a peek, he opened his eyes to see the living room filled up with people that he knew. Everyone from NG, his sister and parents, some people had brought friends and…a very wet, very angry looking Eiri standing in front of him, giving Shuichi the death look. Tatsuha was the source of the laughing, hysterical on the floor where he'd apparently fallen.

Shuichi felt that he had to say something, to explain. "Uh…where'd the monster go?"

Eiri's eyes narrowed as he stared at Shuichi with even more intensity. Finally, without saying anything, he shook his head and stalked out of the room, leaving a wet trail of footprints and drops behind him. The singer was about to go after him, but then Tatsuha jumped up and grabbed his wrist, turning him to face the group of people again.

"Happy Birthday Shuichi!" Everyone immediately rushed over to where he was, hugging him, shaking his hands, patting his back and head (that was his sister), and congratulating him happily. Drinks were shoved at him, presents given, stories told, all at once, but Shuichi couldn't forget about Eiri. Clearly, it would have taken the grumpy writer a lot of pursuing to attend the party, and even more to have it at his house, and Shuichi had completely wrecked everything in about two seconds. It would probably take weeks for Eiri to forgive him. Great.

Maiko's face popped up before his. "So, when do you want the cake? I made it myself! It's got chocolate, and vanilla, and strawberries, and…" Shuichi nodded his head and listened as his sister went on and on about every ingredient that she'd put in the cake, and why. And people said that they were alike…

Excusing himself for a minute, Shuichi quickly checked the hallways for any sign of his temperamental boyfriend, but the man wasn't lurking in the hallways nearby. Maybe he'd gone to hide out at Mizuki's until the party blew over. Mentally punishing himself for doing such a stupid thing, Shuichi put a smile on his face, re-entered the party, and eventually began to actually enjoy himself, Eiri or no Eiri.

It wasn't until it was finally time to eat the cake, that Shuichi felt that familiar pang of absence when he looked out at the happy faces staring at him. If Eiri had been here, he probably wouldn't be smiling, the singer realized, he'd probably be leaning against the wall, scowling at all the people, waiting for them to get out of his house. As soon as Shuichi blew out the candles, Eiri would have shooed everyone out, with or without their cake. Then he would have retreated to the office, leaving Shuichi to celebrate all alone.

Just thinking about it made the singer angry. This was his birthday party. There was no reason for Eiri to act like such a jerk on what was supposed to be a happy day. Shuichi cursed Kitazawa, for what was most likely the millionth time, for taking away what would have been a good day, if Eiri hadn't been so grumpy and cold.

"Make a wish!" Shuichi was pulled out of his pensiveness as Maiko happily light the candles, signaling for him to blow them out. A smile crossed his face; he had the perfect thing to wish for.

Taking a deep breath, and concentrating hard on his wish, the singer blew out all the candles.

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"Pssst."

"Pssst!"

"Shuichi!"

"Huh…wha..?" What? Where was he? Everything was really dark and foggy, and his head hurt. Suddenly a whooshing of air sounded by his ear.

"Ahh!" Shuichi bolted upright, putting out a hand to steady himself on the bed, but somehow he ended up on the floor, looking very confusedly around for the source of the sound. Where was he? Not in the bedroom, that's for sure. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, and he began to wake up a bit, he remembered what had happened.

The party had lasted for a few more hours after they'd cut the cake, presents were given, games were played, and eventually everyone trickled out the door, leaving Shuichi, Hiro and Ryuichi to clean up by themselves. Well, it would have been by themselves, except of course Tatsuha insisted on staying (wonder why) and Tohma then insisted on staying (to supervise, he said) and then Mika had to stay, because Tohma was driving the car, and it turned into a clean up party which lasted another hour or so at least.

By the time that everyone had left, it was at least midnight, and Eiri still wasn't home yet. Shuichi had camped out on the couch, curled up under a blanket watching tv, and waited for the writer to come home. And waited. And waited. And waited. And then finally, just when Shuichi had promised himself to phone Mizuki in another ten minutes, a very silent Eiri had quietly let himself in the door and snuck by the couch where a sneaky vocalist was pretending to be asleep.

The writer had just as quietly let himself into his office, where Shuichi heard the laptop hum on, and then began typing. Satisfied, he'd fallen asleep.

Now, Shuichi could still hear the sounds of the keyboard clicking away from behind the door, and a crack of light spilt into the hallway. Glancing at the clock, he saw that it was almost two o'clock; apparently Eiri had a deadline coming up.

Carefully, to not disturb the 'creative process', the singer crept over to the open door. A quick peek inside revealed Eiri, looking half dead, slouching in front of the laptop. Piles of papers, empty beer cans, and full ashtrays surrounded the writer. Clearly (to Shuichi) it was time for an intervention. Mizuki had extended a deadline before, she could do it again. Eiri needed to sleep, or he'd be a zombie for the next week or so, and they were going out for supper tomorrow night, as Shuichi's birthday present. It had taken him so long to convince Eiri to take him, and he wasn't just going to roll over and let this deadline steal away their date.

"I wouldn't go in there…he's not going to get another deadline extension, no matter how much he needs it…" The voice came from right behind Shuichi's ear, but when he spun around, there was no one there.

"Hello," he whispered loudly, "where are you?"

"Come over and sit on the couch," the voice commanded, and Shuichi cautiously did so, "Okay, here I am." A dark haired boy seemed to appear from the shadows, gliding toward the couch. He stopped right in front of the singer, taking a glance towards Eiri's office, and in the process offering Shuichi a look at his profile.

The boy was so pretty, Shuichi found himself thinking, he could almost be a girl if that dark, curly hair was longer. His face looked soft, like a child's but judging from his size he was close to Shuichi's age. As he turned back to face Shuichi, the singer saw the most startling blue eyes shining in his face. They pulled.

"You know not to talk to Eiri when he's working," Even the boy's voice was hypnotic, it was so silky and low, it was impossible to ignore. In fact, Shuichi was so busy listening, that he almost missed the meaning of the words.

"What?" he blurted out, wincing. His voice wasn't as soft and smooth as the boy's, and he could swear that for a second, he heard the typing stop. Holding his breath, he didn't talk again until he heard the frantic clicking resume. Then he continued much more softly. "How do you know Eiri?"

"I don't."

"Then how do you—"

"I know you." Shuichi stared at him for a second, trying to place his face. He seemed somehow familiar, but he couldn't think of where he'd seen him before. But there wasn't really anyway to figure out who he was without being rude, so maybe if he bluffed it...

"Um…"

"Oh, you don't know me." His words were more of a statement than a question, so Shuichi sheepishly shook his head. "Good. Anyways, that's not important. You don't need to know who I am; if everything goes right, and you don't mess up, then we'll never see each other again."

Shuichi stared at the boy. "What are you talking about? Don't mess up what?"

"Your birthday wish."

"My what?"

"You wished for Eiri to be happier, so you could be happier," Shuichi nodded, "And I can make that happen. Well, I can help you make it happen."

Shuichi felt his heart quicken. Could there really be a solution to this problem? Could he really make Eiri happier? Then maybe his lover would be a little warmer towards him. If there was really something that he could do…

"How?" He mentally cursed himself for sounding so eager, and again, the typing stopped for a second, while Eiri sighed impatiently, and then it began again. Great, now Eiri knew that he was awake; he'd lost the advantages of stealth.

"It'll take a bit of work, but you should know—"

"Stop stalling and just tell me!" Shuichi felt the blood rise to his cheeks for yelling, but he was so eager to hear about this miracle, that he couldn't help himself. To his horror, he heard the keyboard stop for the third time, and the chair squeak as Eiri got up and opened the door.

"Get off the phone brat! It's two in the morning, and I have to be finished this in four hours! I'm not going to get another deadline, she's already extended this one for two weeks, so be quiet." Shuichi gaped at him, turning from Eiri to the boy, who looked back at him with a cool expression, and then back to Eiri, who was only looking at him.

"Uh, yeah, okay, sorry, I'll be quiet." Eiri retreated back into the office, and Shuichi swung back to the boy.

"Who are you? How'd you know about the deadline? Why didn't he see you?"

The boy laughed quietly. "It'd probably take a century to explain, and it doesn't matter anyways. The important thing is that you trust me, because we can fix this mess. The root of Eiri's unhappiness, is the 'incident' in New York, would you say that's right?"

"Bwa…what? How do you—"

"Well, then the only way to make Eiri happy, is to go to the root of the problem, and fix it." Shuichi stared at him blankly, not comprehending the least little bit.

"Uh…I don't get it."

The boy smiled indulgently. "We have to fix the problem. And the only way to do that is to change what happened."

Shuichi's face fell. "So you're saying that there really isn't any way to make Eiri happy."

"Actually no. I'm saying that there is a way. It's …complicated. Just tell me this: are you willing to sacrifice everything to make him happy?" The boy looked solemnly into his eyes, searching for something.

The singer frowned at him, "Of course, I'd do anything for Eiri!"

Nodding, the boy held out his hand. "I was afraid of that..." But when Shuichi looked at him inquiringly, he didn't continue. "Here, then take my hand."

The singer looked suspiciously at the offered hand. Should he do it? What would the consequences be? "I don't know…"

"Shut up brat! I'm trying to work here! I swear to god, one more time…" A call from the office made up his mind.

"Well, things can only get better, right?" Shuichi reached towards the hand slowly.

"Shuichi!" Eiri opened the door, just in time to see his lover grab at something in the air. What the hell was he up to now? The writer took one more step into the room, and opened his mouth to call the boy, and then everything stopped.

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**Part Two: ** Fixing It

The first thing that Shuichi was aware of was the hand clasped tightly in his. Then, the bright sun shining right in his eyes, where moments ago it had been dark, and lastly, the blaring sound of the city during the day.

He was currently sitting on a dirty looking sidewalk, outside of what looked like an apartment building. Cars were rushing by on the road, people were rushing by him on the sidewalk; all in all, it seemed like a pretty normal day in Tokyo. Except that it wasn't daytime, at least, last time he'd checked. And all the signs were in English.

"Uh…wha…?" A tug on his hand alerted him to the boy's presence, "Um, where are we?"

"New York." Shuichi's eyes widened. He looked around again at all the buildings, and listened for a moment to the conversations swirling around his head.

"Oh my god…I'm dreaming, right?" The boy looked at him with a raised eyebrow. Well, that was a clear answer. Shuichi looked around once more, noticing this time, that the light seemed to have an unreal quantity, like it wasn't fully there, and it made the people seem slightly blurred.

"Not quite a dream…"

"Then what?"

"Well…it's complicated."

Shuichi turned to him, tugging his hand out of the boy's grasp. "Yeah, whatever, complicated, you told me before. Maybe now you can tell me something that makes sense."

The boy laughed, "Unlikely, considering the situation."

"Okay, look. I don't understand how us being in New York is going to help Eiri."

The boy slowly pulled himself to his feet, and stood directly in front of the disturbed singer. Softly, he held out his hand and grabbed Shuichi's, stroking it comfortingly. The singer was thoroughly creeped out, to say the least.

"Look, I know it's surprising, but you gotta believe me, you'll be a lot happier when this is over."

Shuichi rolled his eyes. Could this kid be any more cryptic? "What are you talking about?"

"It's not important. We need to get there."

"Get where?"

"You'll see when we get there." The boy set off down the street, without another look at Shuichi, but the singer could still tell that he was waiting for Shuichi to follow. Said boy waited a moment, just to stress the boy out, and then obediently walked to his side. Together, they set off down the street.

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A few minutes later, they stopped in front of yet another tall, ordinary apartment building, but this one, for some reason, seemed strangely familiar. The boy turned expectantly to Shuichi, who just looked back at him and shrugged.

"What?"

"We're here…"

"Where's he—oh." Shuichi stopped as suddenly it became clear where exactly they were. "It's his old apartment…Kitazawa's! It looks so…clean compared to the last time I was here. Like people actually live here."

"That's because they do."

"What? I thought that nobody's lived here since…they discovered the body."

"They haven't."

"You're not making any sense! Shuichi grabbed the boy's arm, as if wanting to shake the information out of him. "Please, why are we here?"

"To save Eiri."

"How?" This was killing him. If he got any more vague answers, Shuichi felt like he'd probably bawl his eyes out.

"You have to stop him from going to have his lesson with Kitazawa."

"I can't! That happened like ten years ago!" He didn't understand. Who was this weird boy? It had to all be a dream, but it seemed so intense, as though it was actually happening.

"Well, it's all in perspective, right. From where I'm standing, none of it has happened yet. You still have a chance to stop everything from being ruined. You still have a chance to be happy…are you going to take it?" The boy winked at him, and then gave him a push in the direction of the front doors.

"Wha…what?" The words swirled around confusedly in Shuichi's head. Could this be for real? Was there even the tiniest chance that he could change something, because if there was, he would take it, no questions. If Eiri was happy, he would be happy.

Hesitantly, the singer went to stand by the front door of the building, still trying to figure out what was going on. He didn't exactly know all the details of that night, except that Eiri had come up to the apartment, seen Kitazawa, been ambushed by those men, and shot his teacher. So all he had to do was stop Eiri from going up into apartment, and it would all be fixed. Shuichi smiled, that didn't sound so hard.

The singer leaned in the doorway, eyes on the lookout for that familiar splash of blond hair, but it was hard. A lot of people had blond hair, especially kids…

When Eiri did walk by, Shuichi almost didn't recognize him. Those cold, indifferent hazel eyes that he knew so well were replaced with big warm orbs, lit up with excitement. The usual scowl was a happy smile, making the boy look completely angelic. It was good to know that Eiri had once smiled so easily.

The blond boy smiled at him, nodding politely, something that shocked him immensely. Had the older Eiri ever smiled at him like that? As he walked past Shuichi, and opened the door to the building, the singer was snapped out of his admiration. Somehow, he had to stop Eiri. Cursing his stupidity for not coming up with a plan earlier, he did the first thing that came to mind, and grabbed the boy's arm.

"Uh…you can't go in there!"

Eiri stared at him, and the pointedly at the offending hands of his arm. "What are you talking about?" Shuichi, seeing the familiar glare, got the hint and let go.

Shuichi almost gushed adoring. His voice was so cute! But he needed to focus on the situation…suspicion was all over the boy's face. Wincing, he stuttered out, "Uh…there's a…gas leak! Everyone's been evacuated." Stupid stupid Shuichi.

But Eiri seemed to believe him, strangely enough. Apparently this boy wasn't quite as cynical of everything as his lover. "But sensei is in there!" A look of panic came over Eiri's face.

"Um, no, he's not. No one is in there right now." Shuichi thought quickly, "Are you Eiri Uesegi?" Said boy nodded, tilting his head curiously, almost making Shuichi 'aw' at the cuteness. "Um, well, a brown-haired man named Yuki Kitazawa came by here, and told me that if I saw you, to tell you that today's lesson is cancelled because of the evacuation, but he'll see you…later on…when it's safe."

"When will that be?" Eiri's face drooped in disappointment.

"Oh, I don't know," said Shuichi flippantly, "Quite a while, I imagine…probably a few days at least…"

Eiri pouted adorably, and his future boyfriend fought hard to resist the urge to cuddle him. "Okay…well, I guess I'll see him soon then. Thank you pink-hair-san." With that, he smiled, and ran off down the street. For a moment, Shuichi watched him go, the feeling of success welling up in his chest. He had done it! Now, he just had to find some way to get home.

"Uh…creepy-boy-who-lurks-in-shadows? Um, are you still here?"

"Oh, amusing," the boy came around the corner of the building, "I guess you wanna go home?" Shuichi nodded. "Well, you have to wait. As soon as the time runs out, you'll go back."

"How long will that take?"

The boy shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, "It varies…" he smiled at Shuichi and promptly disappeared from sight. What? Why did creepy shadow lurking boy get to leave? The singer spun around on his heels, mouth wide open, only to collide violently with a group of men rushing towards the building. Somehow, he managed to knock two of them over.

Lying on the ground moaning, Shuichi could hear the angry murmurs of the people he'd hit. "God, watch where the fuck you're going, kid!" The singer jumped up and offered a hand to the angry man glaring up at him.

"Oh, I'm really—"

Flash.

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"—sorry?"

Shuichi shook his head to clear away the stars, and found himself now in the big master bed in Eiri's room. The writer must have brought him in there from the couch. What a crazy dream. Sighing, he rolled over and came face to face with a big bundle under the covers. What? Since when did Eiri ever come to bed when he had a paper due?

The singer smiled. His boyfriend must have come to his senses. Or maybe he was done already, and it was later than he thought. Shrugging, Shuichi leaned over and hugged the bundle for a moment, softly as to not wake Eiri up, and then rolled over to snuggle into the comfy pillow. It wasn't often that he got this luxury. Maybe Eiri felt bad for yelling at him about talking to…wait…had that happened? It seemed real, but that weird boy had been there then…whatever, it was all so confusing; the best thing to do was get some much needed sleep.

Just as his eyes were about to close, there was a rustling sound behind him, and suddenly an arm was around his waist, pulling him across the bed. A nose nuzzled into his cheek.

"Hello there Shuichi...I missed you." The singer smiled and reached a hand back to run through Eiri's hair. His hand was caught before it got there though, and pressed to a cheek.

"I had a dream about you," Shuichi mumbled, "You were," he sighed, "So happy…"

"I'm always happy! What are you talking about?" There was a strange tone to Eiri's voice; Shuichi lightly pulled his hand from the man's grasp and ran it down his face, encountering something strange in the man's mouth. Since when did Eiri have a lip ring?

Shuichi's eyes widened. Something wasn't right about something…turning over, he came face to face with a very handsome, very happy person. Who was not, by any stretch of the imagination, Eiri, nor did he bear any resemblance to the writer.

"Holy shit."

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**Author's Note: ** Hey guys, hope you like the story so far! It's kinda crazy, I know, and slightly confusing...but since I love AUs, I wanted to give it a shot...(The AU starts next chapter...ehe) o()()()o

Please review!


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: **Hallo ya'll! I hope you like the story so far, it seems to me like it's pretty similar to my first one, at least, at first, but I hope that it's gonna be better than that…nothing other than that, so enjoy!

Oh wait, just wanted to say that thanks to an anonymous reviewe, I have noticed that Shuichi's character seems slightly out of character, so I'm trying to fix that...so if he still seems out of character, I'm sorry…but I really love doing these "in depth" explorations of his character…(or at least what I think is in depth...)

**Disclaimer: Don't own it...**

**Chapter Two:**

Shuichi leapt off the bed, staring wide-eyed at the man looking back at him curiously from the bed. His longish brown hair fell into his eyes, which the singer noticed were a nice green colour, but that wasn't exactly the point. The point was that this guy, who'd he'd never seen in his life, was sitting right exactly where Eiri should be sitting, and calling him the names that Eiri should be calling him. (Well, maybe in a perfect world.)

"What the hell did you do with Eiri?" Bringing his fists up in front of his face, Shuichi stepped into the defensive position that Hiro had taught him.

The man frowned up at him. "Who? Did you have a nightmare baby? Its okay, come here," he held out his arms to Shuichi, who abandoned the protective stance and shrunk back with a horrified expression on his face.

"Um, excuse me! Who are you?" It occurred to him that somehow he might have been kidnapped and taken to this room, or maybe he was really sleepy and had wandered into it by accident. Neither scenarios seemed plausible, but, who knew?

"Are you feeling okay Shuichi?" The man rose up from the bed, and to the singer's dismay was wearing only a pair of black boxers. "Do you have a fever or something?" Shuichi found himself backed up with no place further to run. As the strange guy approached, arm outstretched, presumably to feel his forehead, he caught sight of the bathroom door in the corner of his eye.

This was his chance! Shuichi bolted for the door and managed to lock it before the man even knew that his victim had moved.

Looking around, he saw that both his theories about being in the wrong place were…well, wrong. The bathroom, besides looking slightly different was clearly his. There in the corner of the room was his usual strawberry shampoo, and his fluorescent green toothbrush sat on the counter – strangely a nice bright pink one had joined it. And even though he looked around the entire bathroom, he could not find Eiri's toothbrush anywhere.

Okay, something really weird was going on. First, he'd had the party, which Shuichi was almost positive had actually happened. Then he'd met that boy, then the dream…or wait…was it the other way around? Clearly he was still dreaming at the moment, but pinching his arm proved otherwise.

Alright, now there had to be a reasonable explanation for all this; maybe Eiri had gone out to take the script over to Mizuki's house. And maybe that guy in the bedroom was one of Tatsuh'as perverted friends, god knows that it wouldn't be the first time…

Shuichi checked his watch. Three o'clock? Only an hour after he'd talked to Eiri; could the writer have finished that fast?

Something occurred to him. Once, when Eiri had disappeared, he'd ended up at his father's temple. That would explain the missing toothbrush at least. Well, since Shuichi clearly couldn't go back to bed, he could go to the temple and visit!

Thump. Looking down, he saw that he'd run into the counter, and knocked over some stuff. It wasn't his, it must be that guy's, and since that guy was in his house, it was his right to snoop. Shuichi shuffled through the pile of stuff and found a clip on card that said "Dyllon" on it, nothing more, with a picture of that guy smiling above it. Hmm…so his name was Dyllon. Now he knew what name to tell the police when he called the cops on this guy's sorry ass.

"Shuichi! Let me in! What's going on?" The man knocked on the door loudly, and continued to whine for the singer to open it. Right, like he'd fall for that one...again…

The thought of going to the country cheered him up immensely. As soon as he heard the strange guy in the bedroom give up and go back go bed, clicking off the light a few minutes later, Shuichi snuck quietly out of the bathroom through the other door. He went into his closet, quickly shoved some clothes in a bag, and went to the kitchen to get a quick snack for the road.

On the way, he grabbed the phone and began dialing the Eiri's cell phone number, but after another look at his watch, decided to just show up and surprise everyone.

When he turned the light on, a surprising sight greeted him. The entire kitchen was a nice, soft yellow colour, with cute little accessories scattered across the counter that Eiri would never be caught dead near. Shuichi was once again grabbed by the idea that he was in the wrong house, but then he saw one of his sweaters draped across the back of a chair, and his favourite orange cap resting on the counter.

Frowning, he grabbed both things and stuffed them into the bag, and went to investigate the rest of the house. Even if he was dreaming – he pinched his arm again; nope – damn. Maybe it was a painful dream...but it really didn't feel like a dream. It felt unnervingly real – more real than any dream that he'd ever had.

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About an hour later, Shuichi was in the familiar living room, sitting on an unfamiliar couch, staring at the half-familiar front of his favourite DVD. Well, what used to be at least, it was the Nittle Grasper live concert, special edition. Staring back at him were the familiar faces of Ryuichi, smirking sexily, and Noriko with a cute grin and pigtails. That was all okay.

But between them was something that troubled Shuichi more than the toothbrush, the yellow kitchen, and even waking up with that weird man in his bed. Smiling widely at the camera, was that same man, sitting at Tohma's keyboard, occupying, in fact, the very spot where, hours before when Shuichi had been watching the video, Tohma had sat. The singer scratched at the cover with his finger. Was this some weird trick?

The man's smile was creeping him out more than Tohma's small non-grin ever had. Maybe that guy was some creepy fan who was stalking Tohma, and he'd done away with Eiri in an attempt to get closer to the keyboardist! But that still didn't explain the kitchen or anything…

On a whim, Shuichi slipped the DVD into the player, just, he told himself, to calm down before going to see Eiri. As soon as he saw the familiar faces, he would feel better, and he could leave.

The video began, as always, with the figures in the darkness, playing the instruments quietly. Shuichi felt his shoulder muscles relax he watched the regular routine; Ryuichi's voice rising higher and higher while at the same time the lights grew brighter and brighter. One by one, Nittle Grasper came into sight. First Ryuichi, who acknowledged the spotlight with a little dance move, then Noriko giggled, waving the peace sign. Shuichi held his breath as the light brightened over the last player, then revealed the top of a familiar top hat.

His breath went out in a whoosh. So the front of the DVD had been tampered with after all, just like he'd thought. The singer smiled, reached over and paused the movie.

"Uh…ahem…" Someone cleared their throat behind Shuichi; the singer jumped to his feet. Oh crap, he'd forgotten that the tampering thief was still in the house.

"If you don't leave me alone, my boyfriend Yuki's gonna beat you up!" Shuichi shrieked, whirling around to see the man staring at him incredulously. Hey, it hadn't sounded that gay…okay, maybe it had.

"Who the hell is Yuki?" Hmm…clearly this tactic wasn't working, so Shuichi moved on to plan B.

"Look, I'll do anything you say, just please don't hurt me!" He fell to his knees dramatically in front of the man, reaching out a shaking arm to grab his foot. Hehe, he was good...

Dyllon just looked down at him with a confused expression. "What are you talking about? What's the matter with you Shuichi? Did you have a nightmare or something?" He offered a hand down to the leech still clutching at his socked foot, but Shuichi ignored it; clearly this guy wasn't getting the picture.

He glared up at the man ferociously, "Don't play all pretend with me! I've already figured you out! I know that you want to be a member of Nittle Grasper, so you're stalking me to get close to them!" The singer leapt to his feet so that he could access the door more easily. A hand strayed over his bag strap lying on the floor.

Dyllon gaped at him for a moment, but managed to collect himself. Sighing, he went over and sat down on the couch, facing Shuichi. "Look, Shu, seriously, it must have been a nightmare—"

"No! Why do you keep saying that?" He began to take slow, deliberate steps backwards, in the direction of the door. If he could get within 10m, it would probably be safe to bolt; there was no way that big old guy could catch him in that short time.

The man squinted at him, and, to Shuichi's surprise, pinched his own arm. "Ow! Okay...not a dream...am I hearing you right? Shuichi, I _am_ a member of Nittle Grasper! And I'm not stalking you, we live together!" Peering closer in the singer's face, he adopted a worried expression. "Did you run into the wall again?"

Shuichi's eyes widened, "No, you're lying! Get away from me you stalker!" He pushed Dyllon away from him and jumped up off the couch. Dyllon calmly watched the singer stand there, shaking in anger, with an accusing finger pointed from at him. To his surprise, when he looked at the TV, he saw that the Nittle Grasper DVD was playing.

"For God's sake Shu, look, you're even watching the DVD." Shuichi watched in horror as Dyllon flicked the play button, and the camera continued to pan down over the top hat to reveal Dyllon's grinning face underneath.

"Holy shit…" he whispered, "What did I do…?" Walking up to the screen, he poked the picture of the man, as if to see if it were actually there. The singer stole a look back at the man sitting on the couch. Clearly, it was the same guy.

"Holy shit…"

Dyllon got up off the couch, and came around behind Shuichi, attempting to wrap his hands around the small boy's waist, but he escaped in time, turning to face this strange man who'd appeared in Eiri's house.

"This is NOT good. Oh no, this is not good…holy shit what did I do? Oh god…" Shuichi sunk to the floor loosely, slipping from the man's grasp, "What happened? What changed?"

Dyllon knelt down to look him in the face, clearly concerned for the boy's welfare; Shuichi could feel his eyes welling up with tears already. Where was Eiri? He needed him there, to ground him.

Something occurred to the singer, as he looked up into the man's questioning face.

Shuichi interrupted, "If you're a member of Nittle Grasper…then where's Tohma?" Of all the reactions he expected, the singer never thought that the man's face would suddenly close up like that. Dyllon developed a hard, steely expression on his face, and took a step closer to the singer. Suddenly, this man, of whom Shuichi hadn't really been afraid, was incredibly intimidating. Dyllon grabbed the singer's arm.

"Why do you have to bring that up?" His face seemed to crumple for a second, and then he resumed the rigid look, "I thought we promised that we wouldn't talk about it anymore…you know …" Shuichi was backed up against the wall.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, I...uh…forgot! Um, I think you were right, I must have had a nightmare, I woke up with some strange ideas," the singer laughed nervously, "Well, that's that, um, I'm going now to go visit Yuki." There was an attempt to lean down and grab his knapsack, but it was quickly aborted by the look in the other man's eyes.

Dyllon punched the wall beside Shuichi's head, and the singer could feel his heart stop. This man was crazy! "Um…" Clearly there were some mental problems involved in this scenario...um, can anyone say bipolar?

"Why did you have to talk about him?" Dyllon looked down to him, and Shuichi was shocked to see tears in his eyes. What was the big deal anyways? It was only Tohma….although…something really strange was going on. Meanwhile, the man flung himself away from the wall and started pacing around the room.

"Why…why…I couldn't….why…" He looked up to see Shuichi giving him a weird look. "Okay, I can't deal with this right now, we'll talk in the morning, oh shit, I have to get some sleep, or tomorrow will be crazy…" Dyllon mumbled off, rambling about something or another. Before he left the room though, he shot Shuichi one last sorrowful look, then left the singer by himself to contemplate the weird behavior. But who knew? Maybe this guy acted like this all the time...

He needed to get out of there...heaving his back onto his back, he headed for the door, but was stopped by a sheepish voice. "Oh damn it…" Shuichi looked over to see its owner walk out from the shadows, just as he had a few hours earlier. Jumping up, the singer ran to the boy and grabbed his shoulders. A funny tingling feeling went up his arms.

"What's going on?" He dropped his hands away, and threw himself on the couch, gazing up at the boy with beseeching eyes. "Why is the house so different? Why does that guy think that we're going out? And what's with the video? It's a fake, right? And. Where. Is. Eiri?" Staring directly at the boy in an attempt to nerve the answer out of him, Shuichi concentrated so hard that he almost fell off the couch.

The boy avoided looking him in the eyes, choosing to answer the first question to the floor. "Um, well, I was afraid that something like this might happen, but the important thing is to keep calm…" He kneaded his fingers together nervously.

Shuichi jumped up, clenching his fists, "What do you mean 'something like this'? I don't understand! What's going on?" Why wouldn't the boy look at him? This was not going to be a good thing...

The boy shifted awkwardly on his feet. "Well, it seems like when you tried to save Eiri--"

"Wait," Shuichi interrupted, confused, "That actually happened?" He looked closely at the boy, who nodded his head. "But that's not possible. It doesn't even...um, sorry, what were you saying again?" Blushing, he closed his mouth and allowed him to continue.

"Uh, well, when you tried to save Eiri, you may have…er…inadvertently have set off a chain of reactions…" The boy took a deep breath, and continued, "That caused you and Eiri to never meet each other…" Shuichi's eyes bulged out. What? How could this be happening? He'd wanted to save Eiri, not lose him forever! Fortunately, the irony was not lost on him. More relevantly, none of any of this made sense…well, except now the part with the strange man in his bed and the redecorated apartment, that did.

"So you're saying that Eiri is happy." Shuichi paused to glare at the boy, eyes burning, "But he's happy without me?" This was getting ridiculous. In an final attempt to wake up, he slammed his fist against his shoulder as hard as he could, but only succeeded in knocking himself flat out onto the couch.

Looking vaguely concerned, the boy nodded. "Well, basically…probably…yeah." His head began to spin. Some things were starting to piece together, like 'why' this had happened…although 'how' was still up in the dark. And there was somewhere he could find it all out.

His former plan reoccurred to him. "I need to go to visit him, right now." Then, he could see some proof with his own eyes – Shuichi still couldn't believe that he'd ever go out with that quack.

The boy blinked, surprised. "What? Uh, maybe that's not such a great idea…"

Shuichi, who was already halfway to the door, turned back. "Why not?" What else could possibly go wrong now? This was definitely as bad as it got.

Once again, the boy wouldn't look him in the eyes, instead favouring the wall to his right; the singer could tell that he was still hiding something. "Well, you don't know where Eiri is, and besides, who knows what else has changed, and…"

But he was being ignored by Shuichi already, who had a dreamy look on his face. "No matter what, Eiri will love me," he proclaimed, rushing out the door, yelling over his shoulder, "I'm going to the temple to find out his address!"

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After finally finding a taxi, Shuichi had convinced the driver to take him all the way to the temple. He had not been pleased to see that his wallet was not in the front pocket of his bag, where he usually kept it. Fortunately, the cab driver had agreed to wait while he went inside; hopefully Eiri would lend him some money.

Now, as he bounded up the walkway leading to the door, excitement swelled in his chest. What would Eiri be like? Would he smile? A lot? Or maybe even laugh?

Surprised, Shuichi stopped in his tracks. He'd forgotten that it was so early in the morning; the entire front of the house was darkened. Not one to be so easily defeated, the singer decided to go around back and see if anyone was awake there. Luckily for him, he thought, as he drew closer, he began to hear the sound of people's voices, and some filtered lights came into sight.

The singer quickened his steps. Was that his Eiri talking? He was so excited to go inside, that he didn't even see Tatsuha as he sprinted past and grabbed the handle of the door. In fact, he wouldn't have even noticed the teen, if Tatsuha hadn't spoken up.

"Oh, I don't think that you want to go in there…" A lazy voice sounded to his left, and he saw a familiar face emerging from the shadows. Tatsuha smiled an unusual grin, more of a lazy smirk, and as he sat down on a bench near the singer, Shuichi saw that he had a developing black eye, and there was a thin trickle of blood running down the side of his face. "They're fighting again, and believe me; you don't want to get in the middle of it." Loud shouts and banging were evident on the other side of the door. Taking the monk's advice, Shuichi cautiously sat down beside the boy, and, fishing a tissue out of his backpack, started mopping up some of the blood on his face.

"You know," Tatsuha started, with a strange look on his face, "I feel like I should know you…you seem so familiar for some reason…" Shuichi looked up at the teen, wondering what kind of life he'd had in this world. His hair seemed a little longer than the other Tatsuha's, his face a little gaunter (actually, his whole body seemed more thin than the usual fit boy), and his eyes, they had this look in them that the Tatsuha who Shuichi knew never had. Something didn't seem right…he was getting an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach, which never boded well.

"Uh, my name is Shindou Shuichi…so…is Eiri here?" The black-haired teen immediately whipped his head to stare at Shuichi.

"You talk about him with such familiarity…so you must know him," Tatsuha said thoughtfully, "But I've never seen you around here before, even if you do seem as though I've met you before. And if you really did know him, you'd recognize his voice from…" Here, Tatsuha waved his hand in the direction of the yelling. Listening closely, Shuichi made out the sound of Eiri's deep voice shouting in a way that he'd never heard before. In fact, he'd never really heard his lover raise his voice at all. Was it just that this version of him was more free with his words, more rambunctious? Or maybe something more

"Is he…always this loud?"

Tatsuha laughed loudly, fakely, "I guess you really don't know him…if you did, you'd know that he's always been like this, ever since New …" Here he stopped, wincing. Shuichi wasn't sure if it was from the pain of his cut, or if he was mentally punishing himself.

"New York?" When the teen nodded, Shuichi ventured innocently, "What happened?" What could possibly have happened? He'd fixed it so that Eiri never got attacked by Kitazawa and those men, so why would New York be so bad? Shuichi's worry had evolved from just being uneasy about Tatsuha, to having a terrible feeling about this whole situation.

Tatsuha examined his face closely. "Do you really know my brother?" Shuichi nodded for a second, but then reconsidered. The Eiri he knew could be very different from this Eiri. He shook his head. The teen smirked again. "That's kinda what I thought. Well, you know, normally, I don't tell people this, but since you're so cute…" The teen leaned into Shuichi, and he caught a glimpse of the old Tatsuha. "Promise not to tell anyone that I told you?"

Shuichi nodded solemnly. Was he finally going to discover why he wasn't with Eiri in this world?

The teen squirmed around on his seat for a minute, clearly torn between telling someone his story and fear of...something. "When Eiri was a kid, he was…different. And he looked different too, so obviously, he got teased a lot about his hair and his eyes," Shuichi tried not to sigh impatiently; he already knew this part of the story… "So Tohma, a friend of the family, and my sister's boyfriend, took him to America, New York specifically, to continue his 'studies' with a tutor. And it worked out for a while, but of course it couldn't last..." Tatusha chuckled wryly, and leaned back to stare up at the stars wistfully. "Then one time, when Eiri was out, this tutor, Kitazawa was attacked in the apartment by some men and they shot him. Eiri went to visit his tutor later, and found Kitazawa's dead body…

"I guess he thought they were coming back for him or something, and he picked up the gun still lying on the floor, and shot the next person to come through the door. It just happened that that person was Tohma, looking for him.

"…I really don't know why I'm telling you all this…" Tatsuha turned to grin at Shuichi, but saw the boy staring at him with an open mouth, and a horrified expression on his face.

Damn! He hadn't even..."I didn't think of that," he mumbled to himself, "Stupid, stupid to not think it through…" If only he'd planned it out, had enough time to sit down and completely thought the entire thing over, and then maybe he could have avoided this whole situation.

Tatsuha was currently staring at him half-curiously, half-frightened. "Um, sorry, what? What are you talking about?" The blood on his face continued to drip from above his eyebrow, but the teen didn't seem to notice it other than causally smearing it across his forehead with an already dirty sleeve.

Caught up in the gruesome sight, Shuichi forgot for a second to answer the inquiry. "Uh, no just, I didn't expect…that…sorry, keep going…" Please, please don't let it get any worse...

With another strange look, the teen continued, an absent lick of his lips clearing yet another smear of blood from his mouth. "Well, there really isn't much left, except when he came back, he was completely different, and it changed us all…I guess that's probably why—"

"Tatsuha!" A roar was heard from inside the house, "Who the fuck are you talking to?" The boy scrambled to his feet with a frantic look on his face as Eiri burst through the door and stalked towards him.

Well…it wasn't really Eiri. Not really. It couldn't be. The real Eiri had nice blond hair; this guy had cropped badly dyed hair. The real Eiri wore nice clothes, and this one was wearing some trashy jeans and a dirty t-shirt; the real Eiri would have died rather than see himself like that. Plus, he looked different; he, like Tatsuha, was thinner, and he had a small pink scar running down his face below his eye. And his eyes were so full of anger that it seemed like it couldn't be contained.

His voice too, was different. It was ragged and rough, not like the smooth voice that Shuichi was accustomed too.

"Eiri," Shuichi whispered, unable to help himself, "What happened to you?" This was not good. Actually, this was worse than just 'not good'. This was about as not good as it got.

Tatsuha looked between them with surprise. "I thought that you didn't know him…" Beginning to edge away quietly, his curiosity got the better of him, and he cautiously stepped towards the singer once again.

"I—"

"I don't know this kid! Who the hell are you? Why do you know my name? Tatsuha, I swear, if you—" Eiri took a menacing step towards his brother.

Tatsuha flung up his hands in front of his face, "No, he already knew! He came here looking for you!" Attempting to run backwards, he tripped and fell down onto his back, still protecting his face with his arms. The singer winced at the sound his body made bouncing off the uneven stones.

Eiri whipped back to Shuichi, who had been watching the exchange with a horrified look on his face. As he saw the anger flash again in the no-longer blond man's eyes, he felt a prickling of fear that he'd never felt with Eiri before, and yet he couldn't stop watching him. Those eyes were as beautiful as ever…but twenty times colder.

"What the fuck are you looking at brat?" There was a scary twitch in his eyes when he stared at Shuichi; it was making the singer very uncomfortable, and also difficult for him to talk properly.

"S-sorry. I just wanted to come and…uh...say hi because, um…" He fumbled around with an excuse, which inconveniently hadn't thought about before; he just hadn't expected Eiri to be so aggressive. What was Eiri doing like this? He was supposed to be happy!

"Because what?"

Shuichi could feel the ominous presence of Eiri looming over him, ready to butcher his excuse. "Uh, um, well, I'm, um, your biggest fan!" There, that was a plausible excuse; the writer got fan mails and stalkers every day. He turned to grin at Eiri. "Can I have your autograph?"

To his horror, it seemed like he had said the wrong thing. The man stood there with the most confused expression on his face, an identical look on his brother's face beside him. "Uh…aren't you Yuki Eiri, the famous romance novelist?"

Tatsuha looked between the two men, between the hopeful expression on Shuichi's face, to the skeptical look on his brother's face. At that point, Eiri cracked up. "Okay," he managed in between gasps, "What the hell? I think you have the wrong guy…my name is Eiri Uesegi, and I sure as hell don't write any of that romance bullshit." Looking a bit surprised, and more than a little suspicious at the laughing coming from his older brother, Tatsuha wasn't even smiling the slightest bit. The scene for some reason reminded him of at his birthday party, when Tatsuha had been on the floor in hysterics from Eiri's misfortune. Now, he wouldn't even laugh with the man.

And now he needed yet another excuse. "Uh...oh…well, wrong person," Shuichi laughed nervously, "I guess I'll just be on my way then…" He spun around, but was stopped by a hand on his shoulder, belonging to Eiri.

"Just a second. Tatsuha, go inside," He gestured towards the door, and the black-haired teen meekly obeyed, the opposite of what the real Tatsuha would have done. Then Eiri focused his attention on Shuichi. "Why are you really here? What do you want from me?" The tired look in Eiri's eyes stopped Shuichi from making up an excuse. Taking a deep breath, he prepared himself to tell most of the truth.

"I…came to see you." He couldn't stand to look the man in the eyes; it was too frightening, and there was so much to be guilty for, now that he'd seen what he had done to Eiri.

"W..what?" Shuichi looked to Eiri in surprise; had the man just stuttered? But then he shook off the idea as Eiri pulled a cigarette of his pocket and lit one up. Leaning against the wall, he shoved his hands into his pockets and turned to examine Shuichi. "Why would you want to do something like that?"

The words caught him off guard, so he answered truthfully, "I needed to see how you were doing after…" The singer caught himself just before the words slipped out, but unfortunately Eiri noticed.

"After what? When have I met you?" He pulled the cigarette out of his mouth to tap some ash onto the ground, and leaned in towards Shuichi, who was standing staring at the ground, raising a questioning eyebrow. "Well?"

"Uh, after um…the um…um…what happened." Could he tell Eiri? Would the man believe him? If he did, would he understand why Shuichi had done it?

"What happened?" The cold tone in Eiri's voice left no room for argument.

There was no other way to go about this, the singer realized, if he didn't get to the point, they might be there all night. Shuichi steeled himself to answer. "After New York."

Eiri made a funny choking sound, and dropped the cigarette onto the ground, jumping back from the wall and Shuichi to stand in the garden, legs shaking. His cold mask fell of, replaced by a trembling, angry man. "How…how do you know about…that?"

Shuichi shook his head, "You wouldn't believe me if I told you." A laugh escaped his mouth unwittingly, which surprisingly didn't anger Eiri.

Instead, the man was staring at him with a very strange look on his face. "You know, I think I know who you are. It doesn't make sense, but… I just know. You're the man. The gas man." He shook his head in amazement, lighting up another cigarette with shaking hands.

A feeling of numbness swept Shuichi's body. How could he know? How could he have figured it out already, at all? "Uh, the gas man? " The singer bluffed lamely, "Um, not sure I know what you're talking about." It would do no good for Eiri to know this much about what happened.

But apparently there was no turning him away from the subject. "Yes you do," The man's intense stare was disturbing Shuichi, as it usually did, "You're him. The one who told me that there was a gas leak, when I was going to visit…" he paused, collecting himself. "How did you know? Were you one of them, who killed him? "Eiri paused, thinking to himself, "No, I don't think so…I mean, you look exactly the same as you did then, and that was a long time ago. No…you're something more; it was like you knew what was going to happen."

Shuichi felt tears begin to drip down his face as he nodded in agreement to what Eiri was saying. "Why did you do that?" The man's voice cracked, "Why did you send me away? Why couldn't I have visited Sensei one last time before those bastards killed him?" A glimpse of the frightened twelve-year-old came through in Eiri's face, in that moment. But then the mask hardened again. "Who are you?"

Shuichi ignored the question, clutching his head in his hands, the occasional sob escaping his mouth. He had completely messed everything up; Eiri was even more screwed up and depressed than before, and it was totally and utterly his fault.

"I'm sorry," the boy choked out, reaching up to Eiri, who looked down at him with an undistinguishable expression on his face, "I just wanted to make you happy." Eiri moved away from his hand, staring at him in…fear? He was afraid of him now?

"I…have to go…somewhere." Shuichi rose from the ground and stumbled out towards where the taxi was still parked, waiting for him. The random thought of the ridiculous cost of his ride suddenly occurred to him, along with the fact that he _still_ didn't have any money. He tried to run faster.

"No! Wait, stop. Stop!" Eiri suddenly grabbed his arm again, pulling the boy to stare him directly in the eyes. "Who are you? Tell me, and I'll let go." Appearing to steel himself for some terrible reply, the former writer drew himself up grandly.

But instead of answering, Shuichi smiled sadly, and softly, slowly leaned up to graze his lips against Eiri for a fraction of a second, before drawing back and slipping from his grasp. As he hopped into the taxi and was driven away, he could see that the man was still standing in the driveway, holding a confused hand to his lips.

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Quietly, Shuichi let himself in the front door, attempting to wipe the last trace of tears off his face in case Dyllon was waiting up for him. Yeah, that would be the perfect end to an absolutely perfect night, in fact, maybe he'd go and wake up that weird guy so that Dyllon could yell at Shuichi again for talking about his boss. Who Shuichi had indirectly killed. Well, this was just turning out to be one big happy—

"Shuichi! You're home!" The singer slowly turned around from hanging up his coat, took one look at the grinning man standing in the doorway to the living room, and continued off in the opposite direction to the kitchen.

"Oh come on, don't be like that, I'm sorry, okay?" Dyllon trailed after him into the kitchen, grabbing Shuichi's arm as he went to pull some food out of the cupboards. On second thought…ignoring the man's grip on his hand, the singer reached into his bag and pulled out the package of pocky. It's not like he needed the snack in there anymore, he wouldn't be seeing Eiri anytime soon…

Feeling his face start to crumple again, the teen quickly turned his face and buried his face in the cupboard, pretending to look for something.

"Uh…Shu…are you okay? What's going on, where did you go?" There was no answer from the accused, only a gigantic sniffle, followed by some muffled sobs.

"Oh, baby!" Misinterpreting the reason for his sadness, Dyllon leaned over and pulled Shuichi towards him, cradling the small boy in his arms. Unseen to him was the eye rolling down on the singer's part.

There was a struggle on many limbs, but it didn't do any good, so Shuichi twisted his head to glare at the man. "I. Am. Fine. I just went out to visit a friend, and we…got into a fight. But it's okay…I'm okay." Suspiciously, Dyllon man spun Shuichi around and examined his face for a lie, and seeming to believe him (after all, it was partially true…) he smiled and hugged the boy again.

Face pressed tightly against his shirt, Shuichi was finding air a rarer and rarer necessity. "Well, I think I'll be going off to bed now, good night…" he shoved the man's chest away from his face, and with as much dignity as possibly, walked from the kitchen and into his room. Phew. He collapsed on the bed…he'd get some sleep tonight, and then figure out how to find that boy and get things back to normal. Until then, he would have to pretend that he fit into this world, whatever changes had come with Tohma's death.

As he lay back onto the pillows, melting into the softness, a rude, intrusive sound came from his backpack. What the hell? Upon dumping the sack onto his bed, Shuichi found his cell phone vibrating around the bed, singing some unintelligible tune (as most of them do). When he picked it up, the singer was pleased to see that it was the same cell phone that he normally had…but when he flipped it over out of habit, the stark reality of the situation bit him in the ass. There was the photoshot picture, with the same border, in the same place…but instead of his Yuki giving that cute half smile, there was Dyllon, grinning broadly as he kissed Shuichi's cheek. And Shuichi, that traitor, was smiling right back at him, a hand cupping the man's face.

That was it. This ended first thing in the morning. Without bothering to check who was calling, Shuichi threw the cell phone back into the bag and promptly fell asleep on top of the covers, curled up in a protective ball.

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Author's Note: Yah! It finally gets good...well, better at least; I'd have to say that this is one of my favourite chapters, mostly because the scene between Tatsuha and Shuichi was the first one that I wrote when I was brainstorming for the story...er, I guess there's no reason that this would make it my favourite, but you know how it is...um...yes...

Read and Review s'il vous plait!


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: **Hey guys, wow, It's been a constant struggle with this chapter. I don't really like editing too much, because I just end up changing everything, and it gives the whole thing a new tone. And yet, artistic remorse, you know? But of course, when I've gotten myself into such a crazy mess of plot, trips over random side plot it's good to read things over. Still, I end up missing things, so the point of this ramble is that if you happen to see anything that doesn't fit, just let me know and I'll fix it )

**Warning:** meh, limish ness, won't tell you with who though :P I changed the rating to M just in case, also because there's a lot more swearing in this chapter.

**Chapter Three:**

"Up and at 'em Shuichi! Rise and shine! Oh, it's a beautiful day, a beautiful day, oh what a beautiful day!" Our hero was rudely awakened in the morning, by the terribly belting out of an intruder in his room. As his muddled mind struggled to make sense of things, he blearily perceived a blurry figure standing in the doorway, gesturing madly at the ceiling with the hand that wasn't currently holding a tray of food…since when did Eiri do showtunes?

"I made you breeeeeeakfast!" An annoying voice continued to proclaim to half of Japan, "For my lovely, lovely boyfriend!" With a jolt, Shuichi remembered the events of the past day. Flying into a sitting position, he flailed around confusedly for a moment, not really sure what to do, but not wanting to talk to Dyllon.

Too late. The guy leapt onto his bed happily, presenting Shuichi with a tray laden in toast, eggs, coffee and some fruit. "I made you breakfast, American style!"

The singer nodded uneasily, "Heh…yeah, I see that…" Not seeming to catch the sarcasm, Dyllon smiled broadly and pushed the tray closer to him.

"Well, I made you toast, see, right here you can see the lovely browned colour, just the way you like it, and I put lots and lots of jam, because I know that it's your favourite, and then the eggs…" In amazement, Shuichi listened to Dyllon rattled off a list of his most loved foods. Wow, maybe they really were dating, if this guy knew so much about him. "…and an apple a day keeps the doctor away!"

For a moment, the singer just stared at the gleeful man sitting on the bed, seemingly on the verge of clapping his hands together and jumping up and down. Was this the same guy who had flipped out on him for asking about Tohma? The polar opposite personalities reminded him of a certain hyperactive thirty year old. Speaking of the cute star of Nittle Grasper, Shuichi wondered briefly how he was doing without Tohma breathing down his neck. Heh, probably having the time of his life.

"Uh…Dyllon?" Shuichi wasn't exactly sure how to broach the subject, considering how the man had reacted last night, "Um…about Nittle Grasper?" Dyllon stared at him, clearly waiting for him to go on. "Well…um…you see—"

"—Oh my god! We're late for work! Shuichi, come on, get your lazy butt out of bed, and get dressed, or Noriko's gonna…" Here, instead of voicing the horrible torturing his body would receive, Dyllon just shuddered and gave the singer a meaningful look. Then, he jumped off the bed and into the bathroom, where seconds later, Shuichi heard the sound of the shower.

The boy just sat in the bed and stared at the door. "We?"

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Shuichi stalked around the rooms of the apartment, looking desperately for that kid. What was his name again? Oh right, he didn't know, because that little question dodging boy who claimed that he knew the singer from somewhere. Right…he would have noticed if he had met a creepy stalking boy at any time in his life.

After confirming that the boy was not in the living room, despite that being the only place he'd seen him, Shuichi moved onto the kitchen. Maybe there was some sort of button in the cupboards or something…

"Shuichi!" At the sound of the high-pitched scream, said boy jumped up about three feet, which unfortunately in those three feet, a cupboard door was included.

"Oww…" Picking himself up from the floor, Shuichi glared at the anxious man.

Unfortunately, it was lost on Dyllon. "What are you doing? Why aren't you dressed…well, you are dressed, but you wore that to bed! Ewwww!" He waved his hands frantically around his head, "Get ready!" A hand shot out to grasp Shuichi's arm, but the singer shook it off.

"Um, actually, I think that I'm going to take today off…" Biting his lip, Shuichi attempted to exit the room without giving him a chance to react, but just as he got to the door, a hand snaked out and grabbed his arm tightly.

The singer turned to see a very large close-up of the man's face. "Oh no you don't!" Dyllon grinned mischievously. "As your boss, I can't allow that. Plus, I can't leave you here to mope about that old boyfriend of yours…" When he saw Shuichi's face, the man laughed. "Oh, don't think that I didn't know you were visiting an old flame last night!" Still laughing to himself, Dyllon skipped out of the room, yelling over his shoulder, "I'll meet you in the car in ten minutes."

His legs were made of jello. Well, maybe not jello, because jello was really amusing…it was more like jello powder. Anyways, to summarize: they felt weak, and thus, Shuichi collapsed onto the couch. Boss? Who was this guy anyways? Why was he practically living Tohma's life (with a bit of Eiri's life on the side)? And how come he'd never heard of him from Tohma or Eiri before? Each time he learned something, this place got weirder and weirder.

Where was that boy?

Shuichi's cell phone rung, scaring him out of the frantic search. Fumbling around, he flipped it open, but before he could answer, an obnoxious voice blew over the earpiece.

"Where are you! We're going to be SO late!"

It took the singer a moment to realize who is was. "Dyllon? Are you calling me from the parking lot?" Shuichi sighed frustratedly. Couldn't he get a second of peace around here, or was he doomed to be constantly smothered by this immensely overbearing man?

A loud, booming voce answered both questions. "…where else would I be? Get your ass down here or I'm coming back up to get it! And then it's mine forever! Muahahah!" Great...not only was this guy smothering, bipolar, and clinically insane, but he was clearly overprotective.

In response, Shuichi hung up the phone, but immediately it rang again. "No Dyllon! My ass is not yours!" The moment the words left his mouith, the singer somehow knew that he would regret it.

"…hello? Shuichi?"

The singer shut his eyes slowly and sank to a semi-prone position on the couch. "This isn't Dyllon, is it?" As if things like this constantly happened to him...could the day get worse?

Barely concealing hysterical laughter, a voice choked out some coherent words, "Uh, no this is Hiro, uh, just wanted to tell you that Suguru's in a mood today, so watch what you say to him. I think it's Tohma's 'anniversary' or something…" Oh crap, Tohma; the singer really didn't think that he could deal with that man today.

Shuichi inhaled deeply. "Uh, okay, except, I don't think that I'm going to be showing up today, I'm feeling a little, ahem, sick…"

There was a short laugh on the other end of the phone. "Ha, good one Shu. Oh, and Ryuichi is visiting, so, uh, you know the routine around him." This conversation got more confusing with every word spoken; it was giving him an intense migrane.

"What?...what routine? Hiro, seriously, I'm not…" He looked up to see Dyllon standing in the doorway, glaring daggers at him, "Uh, I gotta go, we'll talk later."

"Shuichi, remem—"The singer clicked off the phone mid-sentence and turned back to the fuming man at the door. "Uh…hi?"

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Mere minutes later, Shuichi found himself being dragged through the doors of NG Records, arm held in a death grip by one very pissed off Dyllon.

"I can't believe that I'm late for this meeting. God, Shu, what were you doing?" In response, the singer smiled a weak apology, and resumed his search for an escape as soon as possible. Where was an emergency exit when you needed one?

Rounding the corners of the hallway, Dyllon still pulling the singer's arm off, they approached a conference room. Through the windows, Shuichi could see Hiro, Suguru, Noriko, Sakano and Ryuichi sitting around the table. It wasn't a completely unfamiliar sight to him…but something seemed a little off.

Sure, Hiro's hair might have been a little shorter, and Noriko's hair was even a different colour, but it was more the little things that made Shuichi uncomfortable. Things like the fact that Suguru was holding himself a little higher than usual; actually, the normally withdrawn boy seemed pretty cocky.

And on the first glance, Ryuichi seemed normal, which gave the singer a small comfort. But then he noticed something - coupled with the conversation with Hiro earlier, Shuichi realized that the situation might have changed a lot more than he'd thought originally. The usually bouncy singer was lounging around in a chair, arm propped up on the table. His hair seemed different, maybe it was styled in a new way, but it was more of what wasn't there. Namely, a cute pink bunny that followed Ryuichi everywhere. Where was Kumagoro? And speaking of missing people, where was Tohma? Did he usually come to these things? Wait, Hiro had said something about an anniversary; maybe he was taking the day off...

Shuichi hoped to hell that the missing bunny was the reason that Ryuichi looked so serious, but truthfully, he knew that something was really messed up.

"Come on Shuichi, what're you doing? Let's go!" Dyllon pulled on his hand, but the singer was rooted in spot in front of the conference room. What was so different? He couldn't quite put his finger on it. Suddenly, Ryuichi looked up and saw him there. Their eyes met, and for a second, Shuichi could see a hint of excitement that he could recognize. Then, the rock star's eyes glazed over, and a smirk crossed his face. Ryuichi raised a hand and casually flicked his hand in semblance of a wave.

Suguru noticed the movement, and looked out the window to see who the man was looking at, and saw Shuichi standing out there. An annoyed expression crossed his face, and he nudged Hiro, who looked up and smiled, signaling for the singer to come in.

Taking a deep breath, Shuichi let himself be dragged into the conference room.

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"Where the hell were you?" Suguru marched right up in front of Shuichi's face and glared up at him, fury practically radiating off him. "We've been waiting forever. We have lives you know, we don't live to wait for you! God! What the fuck is your problem?"

The singer squeaked and stepped back as Suguru shoved him in the chest. Since when was the boy so aggressive…and strong? "S-sorry?"

The keyboardist backed off about an inches, still right up in the singer's face, scowling hatefully. "That's right you're sorry, god damn it Shuichi, this had better be the last time, or—"

"Aw, leave the poor guy alone…" A drawl came from the corner, "He said he was sorry…" Ryuichi sat up and raised an eyebrow in Suguru's direction. To Shuichi's surprise, the keyboardist blushed furiously and went back to the table. The brown-haired man grinned, showing his teeth. "Come sit with me, Shu-chan."

Shuichi brightened at the mention of his usual nickname. Smiling happily, he walked over and sat beside the man, leaving a disgruntled Dyllon to sit down across from him. As he sat down, he caught a frantic motion behind Ryuichi's head, and saw Hiro waving his hands and making a cutting motion across his throat. Confused, he tilted his head, and seeing this, Hiro just sighed and sunk his head into his hands. For some reason, he looked unhappy.

Looking up, he saw Dyllon looking at him questioningly. What was with these people? He shrugged helplessly, and turned to Sakano.

"So, why did you call this meeting?" The man stared at him in confusion, but before he could answer, Noriko cut in.

"What the hell are you talking about Shuichi? You called this meeting! Remember? Yesterday morning, you told us that we needed to talk about something important?" She rolled her eyes in his direction, sighing pointedly. "Okay, do you remember now? Can you tell us so that we can get on with our lives?"

Shuichi's mouth opened in surprise. Oh crap, how was he going to get out of this one? Now everybody was looking at him expectantly, and he had to say something. Even Dyllon looked like he had no idea what was going on. Alright, he had to brainstorm. What reasons could he possibly have for calling a meeting?

His mind was drawing a blank; he needed a way to stall for just a minute. Thankfully, he noticed something important. "Hey," he jumped up, "Where's K-san? We can't start a meeting without him! He'd blow us up!"

The occupants of the room all adopted an incredibly perplexed expression that told Shuichi that once again he'd said the wrong thing.

Noriko recovered first. "Who?"

Wincing, Shuichi lowered his voice slightly, adopting a pleading tone. "You know, K-san? The crazy gun wielding American producer? Long blond hair, really tall and loud and scary? He...er..." Shuichi darted a quick look at the lounging man beside him, "He...kind of, um, watches Ryu-chan?"

There was a snort to his right. "I don't need anyone to take care of me," Ryuichi said calmly, managing to look indifferent and vaguely amused at the same time, "But if _you_ wanted to, you're welcome…" He smirked at the singer, who promptly blushed and turned away.

Sakano cleared his throat and poked a murderous Dyllon in the side, shaking his head slightly. "Um, Shuichi, I'm sorry, we don't know who you're talking about."

Tears sprang to the boy's eyes. "But, K! I need him here, he's a really good producer, and even though he's scary sometimes he still—" He dropped off as he realized that the room was otherwise silent, and everyone was giving him weird looks again. "Uh, you know what, maybe it was some dream, I dunno, sorry, um, I'll be right back." Pushing out his chair, Shuichi ran out of the room and down the hall.

Well, at least the hallways of NG were the same, if nothing else. Shuichi spun around a corner and on the spur of the moment ducked into a bathroom. Bracing his hands on the sink, he stared deep into the mirror, trying to see if he was different. He felt the same as ever, although maybe his hair was a little different, but inside he still thought the same way. Well, he would, wouldn't he? It was the same him who'd been celebrating his birthday less than a day ago with his normal friends.

The bathroom door opened to his side, but Shuichi didn't notice who came in until some arms snaked around his waist and pulled him back into a body.

"Hmm…fancy meeting you here…" Ryuichi rested his head on the boy's shoulder, grinning at his reflection in the mirror. "Wow, I haven't seen you since…hm…about a month, my god! Have you missed me?"

Shuichi stiffened and tried to pull away from the man, but Ryuichi caught his arm and turned him around, trapping the singer in between his arms and the wall. "Where are you going? Are you leaving me again? You know, I was very sad that you didn't invite me to your birthday party…" he pouted. His expression seemed playful, but there was something about his eyes that just…scared Shuichi.

"Uh, well…I didn't know about it either; it was a surprise party." What was going on?

Smirking, Ryuichi leaned in, "Oh, well then I'm not sad anymore…" The man adopted a pondering expression, "Well, now that that's out of the way, what should we do now?" He drew closer to Shuichi, until his body was flush against the younger boy's.

Shuichi gasped. "What're you doing?" He put his hands on the man's chest and tried to push him away, but it was useless. He could feel his cheeks on fire; actually, his whole body was burning up. Why was Ryuichi acting this way?

"Please…don't…"

The man leaned in closer to Shuichi's face, and paused, his lips inches away from the singer's. "What's wrong baby?" he whispered breathily, "Speak up, I can't hear you…" he smirked, and moved closer to the boy's face, but Shuichi flinched away.

"Ah, so that's the way it is…" For a second, the singer thought that Ryuichi was going to let him go, but instead the man turned to his exposed neck and began trailing kisses down it.

"Argh, get off!" He struggled against Ryuichi's arms, "I don't want…god, please, stop!" Instead of listening, the man proceeded to begin unbuttoning his shirt. Shuichi felt a sob rising in his throat.

"Hey, he said stop." A new voice broke into Shuichi's awareness. Looking over at the door, he saw Hiro standing there with his arms crossed. "Get away from him, man, or I'll give you a black eye better than the last one…I bet you had fun explaining that one to Noriko eh?"

Ryuichi snorted indifferently, but still moved away from the singer. "Oh, I'm sorry, is it your turn now?" His eyes flashed mischieviously, an ironic glance of the former man.

Hiro's eyes darkened and he took a step towards the man, who unwillingly let out a tiny squeak.

"Fine," he said, recovering, grinning widely, "I'll go." Turning to Shuichi, he grabbed the boy's chin and roughly captured his lips. The kiss lasted for only a few seconds, but Ryuichi ran his hands up and down the boy's body for its duration, leaving Shuichi breathless when it was over. As he walked out the door, he shot Hiro one last dark look, and sent a cute little wave over to Shuichi, who had slumped to the floor.

Hiro worriedly looked at the boy who was currently curled up with his head hidden in his knees. "Hey man, are you okay?" There was a slight mumbling from the bundle on the floor. The redhead knelt down beside Shuichi's head and repeated the question.

Instead of answering, the boy just looked up at Hiro for a few second, and he saw that Shuichi was crying. "Why? Why is Ryuichi being like this now? What made him do it?"

Hiro looked confused. "Shu, he's always been like this…ever since we met him." For some reason, this made his friend return his head to his lap and start sobbing.

"Why is this normal?"

"…what?"

"Why is this normal? Why is Suguru being so mean? And where's K?"

Hiro grabbed Shuichi's shoulders and shook him gently. "Look Shu, nobody is acting any differently that usual besides you. What's with that anyways? Who's this K?"

Shuichi's face crumpled again and he pressed his fists up to his eyes in an attempt to hold back the tears. "I…I just wasn't expecting that!" His voice trailed off into hiccups.

Hiro drew back defensively. Was the singer blaming him for this? "Hey, hey, what's the matter? It's not like you didn't know he was coming, remember, I phoned to warn you! And you know not to leave the room alone when he's around, Shuichi, he always comes after you! Seriously, what _were_ you expecting?" He couldn't control Ryuichi; no one could.

In response, Shuichi muttered something into his lap that Hiro didn't hear.

"What?"

The boy looked up from his now wet knees. "Wh-where's Kumagoro?"

"Who?"

That was all the answer that he needed. Shuichi collapsed into Hiro's arms and started shaking and sobbing even harder. "Oh god, what've I done? What…did I do?" The red head sat there patiently, holding him, and listening to Shuichi's ranting. He really had no idea what the singer was talking about, but he figured that maybe they could talk about it later when Shuichi was feeling better.

They had been sitting there on the bathroom for only a few minutes when the door banged open again, and Noriko entered in a fury. Hiro looked up, surprised. "Uh, this is the boy's bathroom…" His words trailed off as he saw the expression on her face.

"Thanks Nakano-san," she snapped, "I need to talk to Shu, came you give us a second?" Hiro complied, peeling an unwilling Shuichi's arms off of him. The boy was holding on especially tight, considering that Hiro seemed to be the only one who hadn't changed, but the red head couldn't possibly have know that, so Hiro reluctantly pulled away from his friend and walked out of the bathroom. He trusted Noriko to be gentle with him; she'd had lots of experience dealing with the trails of destruction that Ryuichi seemed to leave behind.

Back in the bathroom, Noriko had taken Hiro's place and was now hugging the boy tightly. "I'm sorry, oh Shu, I'm so sorry, I sent Hiro after him the minute I noticed that he was gone…he didn't hurt you did he?"

Shuichi managed to reassure her through his sobs that no, he wasn't hurt, but she still looked concerned.

"What's really the matter Shu? We've already been through this before, and you've never reacted this badly to him. You know how we talked about just avoiding him, and not doing things to provoke him…like sitting beside him?" The exasperated tone of her voice provoked Shuichi out of his shell to defend himself.

"But…but he called me Shu-chan! He always calls me that, and he's always nice!" The singer looked at her desperately, wanting her to agree with him, to say that Ryuichi was having a bad day or something...or was on drugs.

Noriko stared at him for a moment. "Hey, what's really the matter? You know that he's never been remotely polite to any of you, unless he wants something…tell me what's really going on." Since the singer's sobs had resided, she was sitting beside him on the ground, rubbing his shoulder comfortingly.

Shuichi took a deep breath, and tried to dislodge the lump in his throat. "I…I just…I…I miss Yuki…" he whispered, his voice cracking, "And one of my best friends…just…attacked me…"

"You miss who? Shu, do you have a secret lover that I'm not aware of?" She winked teasingly, but the singer just turned his head downwards. It was a question of whether to laugh or cry from the irony.

"You used to know about him…but I guess not anymore…"

"…right…" For a moment, she looked at him strangely, and then the rest of his statement occurred to her. "One of your best friends…wait, Hiro attacked you?" A frightening expression crossed her face that made Shuichi want to smile; at least _she_ was as protective as ever...

The singer sighed and shook his head, "No, Ryu-chan!"

"…Ryu-chan? Shuichi, seriously, what's going on today? No one's called him Ryu-chan since…well, a long time ago."

Apparently he was just never going to win, and this whole conversation was just confusing Noriko so he gave up. "Uh, you know what, I hit my head pretty hard last night, I tripped over something, so I guess I'm kind of confused today…"

It seemed to satisfy her, and they sat in silence for a moment, until Noriko spoke.

"You know, he _did_ used to be nice…I guess you never knew him then, but he used to be the best friend ever…we went to school together, and we were friends throughout all of high school, and when we went to Tokyo and met..." she trailed off, her voice choking, "…when we started out band, he always worked hard, and was cheery, and everyone was in love with him."

Shuichi listened half eagerly, half dreading what he was going to hear. But he forced himself to pay close attention; he needed to know exactly what had gone wrong here.

"…there was even a time when he seemed like a little kid, just always giggling and happy, and skipping around, and it always made…" she choked again, "…it always made Tohma smile…Ryuichi loved that, making him smile. It seemed like a lot of the act he put up was for Tohma."

An understanding overtook Shuichi. So that's how it had been…"You never met Tohma, but he was a great guy…he was going to be the original member of Nittle Grasper, you know, he was going on a trip, and when he came back, we were going to start up. But then he never came back…"

Noriko paused and let out a watery laugh. "But then Dyllon came back instead, for the funeral, and we met him, and found out that he played synth too, and everything just happened, and it was easier than finding a new member who we didn't know to take Tohma's place, especially since Dyllon and Tohma had been going out for a few months by that time." Shuichi let out a small gasp. So that was why Dyllon had freaked out on him when he'd mentioned Tohma.

But she misunderstood the gasp, and winced, "Oh, shoot, did you not know that? Oh crap, I'm an idiot, I just—"

"No," Shuichi interrupted softly, "That's not it…please go on…" This information painted the new situation in an entirely different light. Things were starting to make a lot more sense. Ashamedly, the singer found himself enjoying all these stories of how things had changed, all of them branching off from that one incident. It was a nice, detailed look at how his life might have been, and now that he'd seen it, he just wanted everything to be normal again even more desperately.

Noriko startled him by sighing quietly, and continuing her story. "Well, there's not much more, but ever since we said goodbye to Tohma at the airport…Ryuichi wasn't so cheerful, and then when we heard the news, he just left. He was gone for a few months, and when he came back for the funeral, he was already changed. It really broke his heart for his best friend to die like that, but when he heard about Dyllon and Tohma, it hurt him even more. That night, I found him crying in his room at the hotel we shared. I tried to hug him, but he stopped me, and he told me that 'this was it'. I didn't know what he meant, but now, I guess…all this…" Noriko waved her hand around the bathroom, seemingly gesturing to the situation.

"He's always hated Dyllon for taking Tohma's place, that much was obvious. He's just a constant reminder to Ryu that Tohma left him and was with Dyllon instead. He's been digging at the poor guy for years, and you're just one more of his mind games that he plays. Suguru too." The protectiveness came back to her face, but this time laced with a deep sadness and helplessness.

"What?" Shuichi sat up, frowning. "Suguru and Ryuichi?" Now, he definitely hadn't been expecting _that_.

She nodded. "God, you must have hit your head hard. You can't tell me that you didn't know that, I told you myself… Oh god, I don't know how this got so out of control…it's partially my fault; I guess I'm a little intimidated; I don't want to stand up to him." Shuichi despaired for her; clearly her situation was worse than his. All Noriko could do was sit there and watch while her best friend plays with everyone's emotions. Somehow he'd ended up with a halfway decent life - a boyfriend who was only slightly crazy (and particularly more affectionate than Eiri), and he still had his best friend. If he hadn't known what his life had been like before, Shuichi knew that he would have probably been just as happy living like that.

That was the problem: he was still happy. "Saving" Eiri hadn't really changed his own life, but everyone else was fucked.

"No," Shuichi chuckled dryly between sniffles, "It's entirely my fault…I was so selfish, I just wanted to be happy, but I messed everything up. I didn't think about how it would affect everyone else…" There was really no use trying to explain it to her, but it let some pressure of his chest.

Noriko shook her head, "What are you talking about?"

Shuichi didn't answer her question, but smiled up at her. "Thanks for telling me, I needed to hear it to understand…" she nodded, and he continued, "I'm…I'm sorry Noriko, for everything, this is all messed up, and terrible… I'm sorry that you don't have Tohma around anymore, and that—"

"Shh," Noriko hugged him, "It's not your fault! You weren't even there…you didn't even know Tohma…" Wiping her eyes, she climbed to her feet and offered Shuichi her hand.

The singer comtemplated it, then chose to climb to his feet using the wall; he didn't deserve to accept her help. Nonetheless, Noriko smiled gently, and patted his arm. "Come back to the room whenever you're ready. I'll keep an eye on Ryuichi for you, okay?" Shuichi nodded, and she smiled at him. "I'm sorry that you never met Tohma…I think you would have liked him." With that, she walked out.

Shuichi closed his eyes, and leaned back against the wall. "But I did meet him…" he muttered, "And I killed him too…" This was going to kill him too, if he didn't do something. Quickly, he splashed water in his face, scrubbing harder than necessary. His rosy reflection stared back at him from the mirror. "What the hell am I going to do…?"

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After spending a considerable amount of time in the bathroom in an attempt to compose himself, Shuichi finally decided to brave the hallways of NG Studios and go back to the conference room. Of course, he realized that he didn't even have anything to tell them for the reason of calling the meeting, but it wasn't exactly his main concern at the moment. He would just tell them what he told Noriko, and hopefully they would believe it, then he could go home and—

Suddenly, out of an empty room, a hand reached out and clamped down on his arm, pulling him back out of sight, and looking the door behind him. Since the room was pitch black, Shuichi couldn't see his attacker, but he felt hands push him up against a wall, and hold him there. God, did everyone here just want molest him? Or just one _really _persistent person.

So that was how for the second time that day (or was it the third, considering very early this morning with Dyllon…?) Shuichi found himself pinned to a wall, and someone else was pressed up against him. "God, Ryuichi, get off, or I'll tell Hiro…" A short laugh blasted him in the face.

"This isn't Ryuichi." Shuichi's breath caught in his throat. That voice…it couldn't possibly be who he thought it was, could it? He flung out an arm and, feeling a light switch, flicked it on. Inches away from his face were a pair of familiar hazel eyes, blinking in surprise.

"…Yuki?...what?" Before he could talk anymore the man leaned down and began to kiss him, pressing harder into the boy. Eiri bit his lip into his own mouth, and gained entrance to Shuichi's mouth, exploring it with only slight hesitation.

Shuichi moaned into the blond man's mouth. He had missed this so much…smiling into the kiss, he brought his arms up around Eiri's neck and tried to pull them closer together, running one hand through his silky hair. Pulling back slightly for a breath, he slowly ground his hips against Eiri's to tease the man. He could feel the man responding, and suddenly found himself being slammed against the wall even harder, Eiri's arousal evident against his groin.

"Oh…I've missed you…Yuki…" In response, the man attacked his mouth again, biting his tongue gently. The two pulled and tugged at each other with a frantic urgency, trying to get as close as possible. It was so frustrating; Shuichi groaned lustily, and ran a hand down Eiri's chest, down to his belt, and—

"Shit." Eiri pulled away quickly and and walked over to the other side of the room, sitting down in a conference chair far away from Shuichi. Said boy ignored the obvious gesture and went over to stand right in front of him. Eiri said something quietly, that he didn't catch.

"What?"

"I said, why?"

"Why what?" Shuichi whispered, still breathless from the kiss. His whole body was aching to move closer to the man, but he knew that he should wait.

As an answer, Eiri stood up quickly, and planted another kiss, this time much gentler on Shuichi's lips. "Why," he repeated, "Why does that feel so right?"

"…wha…?"

The man cupped Shuichi's cheek softly, looking deep into his eyes. "Why does it feel like I've done this forever…like we've done it thousands of times before…?" Tears spilled over onto Shuichi's cheek, and in a strange compulsion, Eiri reached up his thumb and wiped them away. He was surprised with himself even, it had been years since he'd felt even a fraction of this emotion towards anyone. It was as though his hands were being guided by a subconscious stronger than himself.

A dreamy sigh escaped Shuichi's lips, and he smiled happily at the man, "…oh Eiri…I've missed you so much…" He reached up a hand to run through Eiri's hair.

Pointedly, the man drew back. "You're doing it again. Why do you talk like you've known me?"

Did he really want to know the answer? There was no way he'd believe him...although, that's what Shuichi had thought before, and then Eiri had somehow known who he was. Was there really any harm in telling him? It's not like it was going to be this way forever; as soon as possible he'd fix everything. And hopefully the writer wouldn't remember a thing.

Shuichi took a deep breath and looked up into his eyes. "I...you...it feels so right, because…you _have _done this a thousand times before…you just don't remember…and..." his voice cracked with emotion, "…and I can't stand that you don't remember being happy with me...it hurts so badly knowing that you can't look back on the memories that I can look back on…" He choked, and dove his face into Eiri's neck, snuggling into the blond man, and taking him by surprise. Eiri didn't think that he'd been held like this since…

Suddenly Shuichi felt himself being pushed away. "No…" The man stepped back from him, with what looked suspiciously like fear in his eyes, "You can't make me remember him…you're making me remember him! I can't, I can't, oh god I can't remember that again, it kills me to remember, oh god oh god oh god…" Eiri sunk to the floor, clutching his head in his hands. When the singer moved to comfort him, he flung out his arms. "No! Get away from me! I can't look at you!" Ignoring this, Shuichi knelt down beside him, and forced Eiri to look at him, but found himself being flung across the room.

Groggily, the singer struggled to a half-sitting position, staring wide-eyed at Eiri, who was still yelling from his corner. "Don't touch me!" Shuichi shrank farther back into the wall. "Why…why? Why did you do it? Why couldn't…why…oh god why?" Eiri staggered to his feet unsteadily, and stumbled towards the door.

"…Eiri…" Shuichi whispered fearfully, frightened by the strong display of emotion.

The blond man half-turned at the sound of his name, and still continued out of the room, but not before whispering back, "No…"

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**Author's Note:** So I had to move all my files, and something crazy is going on right now, I'm not very happy about it :( Fanfiction won't let me upload any files at all, so I'm going crazy trying to update my stories sighs sadly Anyways, it gave me more time to edit this story, which I just discovered reaaally needs it.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: **Hey, what's up guys?

**Chapter Four: Hiro?**

A hand tapped the singer on the shoulder. "Hey, Shu, wanna come over and hang out for a bit before tonight?" The group was gathered in the conference room, packing it in for the night. Strangely, Shuichi found himself glancing over at Dyllon before he answered Hiro's question.

Why was he doing that? It's not that like...uh, creepy, possessive guy owned him or anything, despite what Dyllon clearly thought. With a wide grin on his face, he turned back to his friend. "Uh, sure! Sounds like fun!" Yes! An excuse to get away and do something normal...

As he zipped up the guitar case, Hiro brushed a stray hair out of his face and grinned back.

"Okay! You can help me get ready for the big date tonight," the redhead winked and nudged Shuichi, who squealed excitedly. Excellent...apparently some things never changed.

The prospect of his evening brightened; he might even get a chance to see another familiar face, even though they didn't always get along. Of course, since he and Eiri weren't going out, maybe Ayaka was friends with him. "Are you and Ayaka-chan going somewhere special?"

Hiro paused from his task of putting away his sheet music. "What…actually, who?" Sakano and Dyllon also stopped their conversation and turned to the singer. Oh crap...

Shuichi inhaled deeply and squeezed his eyes shut, promising himself that next time he would think before opening his big stupid mouth. Okay, so most things _did_ change. Clearly, Hiro didn't know Eiri's fiancée. "Um…haha…just joking, of course you're going out with…" the singer laughed nervously, "Uh…someone else…" Oh, nice save Shuichi, he'll never suspect anything.

Shaking his head confusedly, Hiro chose to accept the lame excuse and went back to packing up his guitar. "Yeah, well, I can't wait for you to meet him."

Shuichi choked down an incredulous "him?", covering it up with a cough. Looking up, he saw that Hiro was staring at him expectantly, an eyebrow raised in question. Uhoh, was that not subtle enough?

Time for some first-class acting. "Oh! Okay, cool!" He slung an arm around his best friend's shoulder, "I'm excited to meet him too!" For the moment, it placated Hiro, and the two bounced off together happily. Phew, all this acting was making him feel hyper.

As they departed down the hall, Dyllon and Sakano stared at each other. "Is it just me, or is something about Shuichi a little off today…?"

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Hiro and Shuichi walked through the parking lot of NG Records in silence. The singer was thinking about everything that had happened in the past day. It was amazing that one event happening different could have resulted in all of this.

The guitarist looked over at his friend, lost deep in thought. There was something going on with Shuichi today, but he couldn't think of what it was. Although, maybe he and Dyllon had gotten into a fight, because Dyllon was acting kind of strangely too.

Suddenly, a black streak pulled out from the building and launched itself at Shuichi, who was tackled to the ground. The singer struggled for a bit, panicking as a hand covered his mouth tightly. When he tried to kick up, he found his leg trapped under a way-too-strong knee. On the verge of tears, his next course of action was going to scream, but then he saw the face of his attacker.

"Tatsuha?" Hiro, who was on the verge of throwing the dark haired boy off of Shuichi, stepped back.

"What did you say to him? " The monk shook his shoulders roughly. "What did you say?"

It was then that Shuichi noticed the young boy's black eye and bleeding lip. "Oh, Tatsuha, I'm sorry!"

"It's not your fault, but what did you say? He came home in a really weird mood," the teen frowned, "I need to talk to you. Tell me who you are to Eiri. I need to know!"

"Hello…who is this guy?" Both boys turned to see Hiro standing there, forgotten in the moment. Sheepishly, they picked themselves off the ground.

"Oh, I know his brother…" Shuichi waved a hand dismissively. He _really_ didn't want to get into it.

"Do you?" A smirk crossed Hiro's face, but his friend shook his head quickly. "Not like that," he turned to Tatsuha, "Can we go talk about this somewhere a bit more private than a parking lot?" The teen nodded. "Hiro, can I take a rain check?"

His friend smiled. "Of course, see you around." He walked out of the lot and down the street.

Sighing, Shuichi watched him go, and then turned to the matter at hand. "Alright, where should we go?"

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"So how do you know my brother? He's never said anything about you before…not that he would of course, but I've never found any sign of you in his room when I've been, er, borrowing money."

"Actually, he just met me for the first time that night I talked to you."

The teen laughed shortly before he realized that the singer was serious. "You'd never known each other?" he asked incredulously.

Shuichi squirmed uncomfortably; he really hated telling lies to everyone. "Well…not really. I knew him when he wrote romance novels."

"Eiri never wrote romance novels…"

"Exactly."

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An hour later found the two still deep in discussion in an empty room back inside the building. "…and well, I know this is a…um…delicate topic, but I was wondering if Mika-san was married?

The question surprised Tatsuha, strangely. "Why would it be a delicate topic?" he laughed, "If anything, it was the best thing that ever could have happened to her." When Shuichi looked at him questioningly, he felt compelled for some reason to continue. "Well, when Eiri got back from New York, like I said, he had changed so much; it was like he was a different person. He looked differently, he acted differently, he even talked differently, if he talked at all.

"Our father sent him to a psychiatrist, and it seemed like he might get better, but as soon as he went back to school, it began again. I had to watch when the other boys cornered him, and started hitting him. And I could never help; I was too small. He made me promise me not to tell anyone, and I guess that I thought that maybe he was just going to blow it all off, ignore them, just not react.

"Then, he started lashing out at home, pushing me around because of the smallest thing; once, I tripped and bumped into him, and he threw me down the stairs. I ended up with a broken collarbone, and this, " Tatsuha pulled up his sleeve, revealing a jagged pink scar.

"I thought that I could handle it, him stoically enduing the other boys, and then taking it out on me. It felt like I was a hero, keeping other people safe by sacrificing myself. I was the only one who knew what he was capable of. But one day, one of the boys had a knife, and his friends sat on Eiri's chest while he threatened him. He said that if Eiri didn't cut off his 'disgusting' blond hair, he'd be in big trouble.

"I guess my brother was fed up, because he looked the boy straight in the eyes and spat in his face. The boy, of course, went crazy and there was a struggle; the guys who were holding me down ran over to the fight.

"They rolled around on the ground, limps flying everywhere, and suddenly there was blood on the ground, and everyone just stopped moving.

"Eiri crawled away, and we all we could see was the blood everywhere, and we didn't know who was bleeding so much, until Eiri took his hand away from his face, and we saw the cut dripping down.

"It was so strange, like nothing was real, just for a second, and then Eiri looked down and saw the blood on his hands, and he just lost it. What I didn't know then was that he was vulnerable to flashbacks, and the smell of blood brought him back these intense, vivid memories.

"There was this…this light in his eyes that was so disconcerting. Everyone else must have seen it too, because they stepped back from the one boy, who was looking almost afraid. And if I thought that my brother had been taking everything out on me, I was sadly mistaken, because what he did to this boy was way beyond anything he'd ever done to me.

"Eventually, the boy was lying on the ground, trying to breathe, and begging for Eiri to stop, stop, that he'd give anything if Eiri would just stop. I tried to go over—Eiri was standing overtop the boy –and I touched his arm to get him to come away, but he just looked at me, this…intense, painful look, and I had to jump back, because I knew that he wasn't seeing the boy; he was seeing someone that had hurt him badly.

"So I stepped back and watched as he pulled back his foot and kicked this kid so hard in the head that he lost consciousness.

"Then Eiri blinked, and suddenly he was on his knees beside the boy, screaming as loud as he could, and sobbing crazily.

"I grabbed him and we ran, but he didn't stop crying until that night..." Tatsuha paused and looked over at an enraptured Shuichi. He shook his head and laughed dryly. "I dunno why I always end up telling you these things…you'd better not tell my brother that I told you this…"

"No!" the singer shook his head violently, "I promise I won't! Keep going, please!"

"Okay, well, not much left, but Eiri was in trouble for it, the other boys must have told someone, and from then, he just got worse and he'd beat on me even more. The therapy just made him angrier.

"Although I never told anyone, Mika suspected something. I don't know about my father; he was so engrossed in the temple. Of course, he had to notice when Eiri started pushing _him_ around.

"Then, Mika walked in on us one night, with Eiri pinning me down, his fist raised above my head. When she threatened to tell our father, my brother just laughed in her face and hit her too.

"Unfortunately for him, Mika wasn't quite so meek as me, and she walked right out the door to her boyfriend's house, who came over the next day to pick up her stuff and kick Eiri's ass.

"They got married real soon after that; my father was happy enough to agree considering that he couldn't control Eiri anymore now that my brother was the biggest in the family.

"Basically, she escaped, so that's why she's lucky…"

Tatsuha's words spun around in Shuichi's head. Things had gone so wrong; how could starting with such good intentions end like this? Could it be fixed?

The singer sank to the floor in desperation, briefly registering Tatsuha slipping out the door quietly, leaving him alone with his thoughts. Already he'd ruined so many lives; he'd done so much damage. Eiri, Tatsuha, Ryuichi, Suguru, K, Tohma, everyone he cared about had been affected by his hasty decision. There had to be a way to fix this. If only he could find that boy again, and change it so that Tohma didn't die, then everything would be fine and back to normal.

"…are you sure that you want to try again?" Shuichi's head shot up at the sudden voice, and he saw that the boy in question was kneeling beside him. He didn't question how it happened, that was useless now. He just nodded his head softly, closed his eyes, and waited for the blackness.

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His eyes slowly fluttered open, revealing a somewhat familiar set up. The streets of New York were splayed out before him, so real that he could smell exhaust and street vendors, but still retaining that element of unreality. The air almost seemed fuzzy, but of course that could be chalked up to the smog, considering it felt really hot out.

"Come on," The boy urged, "Let's get moving."

"Where are we…er, I guess I mean, when are we?" Shuichi laughed nervously. "Not exactly something that I ever pictured myself saying…"

"A little bit after you sent Eiri away." They walked side by side down the sidewalk, swerving slightly to avoid people, although Shuichi couldn't be sure that any of these people noticed them at all. "Do you have a plan?"

"Yes," Shuichi lied, trying to come up with ideas, "I've got it covered."

"Do you care to share it with me?" Uhoh...busted.

"Uh…well, the clear course of action is to…er…tell Tohma that…there's a gas leak!" He shook his head sagely. "Yes…that is the only way…"

Looking up, he noticed the skeptical expression on the boy's face. Bah, probably jealous of his brilliant plan.

They arrived at the building in silence; Shuichi still trying to think of a better plan. He was just getting into one that involved the street vendor man, when the boy nudged him hard in the ribs.

"What?"

He pointed down the street, and Shuichi followed his finger apprehensively.

If I ever find it, the scene with Tohma and Dyllon, important because you see how much they love each other, and it can be compared to Tohma and Mika's relationship.

Whistling happily, Tohma walked up to the building, hands tucked away in his pocket. He looked, in a nutshell, very different from the composed man that he would become later in life. There was even a genuine grin on his face as he came up to the doors, practically bouncing.

It was so hard to disturb him, but…

"Oh, excuse me sir, this building has been closed, I'm afraid that you can't go in." Shuichi stepped over in front of the blonde man and crossed his arms, waiting for reprisal. Surprisingly enough, there was none.

"Oh," said Tohma, a slightly dazed expression on his face, "I didn't realize…but…oh. Nevermind, actually. Uh, I'm supposed to meet someone here really soon…have you…?"

It took a moment for Shuichi to answer, shocked as he was by Tohma's reaction. He had never seen the man get so unglued over such a little thing. It was very unnerving to watch, and to think that something in the next few hours had changed his life forever, to the point of being the collected emotionless man that everybody at NG Records knew.

He was snapped out of his reverie by Tohma waving his hand around his nose in an attempt to get his attention.

"Wha? Oh, right, sorry, are you looking for Yuki?"

The blond man frowned and shook his head. "Actually I'm looking for his student, Eiri…he's small, blond…"

Shuichi mentally cursed his stupidity. "Oh, I talked to that boy! Are you Tohma?" Said man nodded. "Well, Eiri said to met him in the park, uh, he said that you would know where he meant."

In yet another surprising move, Tohma grinned widely. "Hey, thanks!" For a second, Shuichi almost thought that the man was going to embrace him, but the moment passed, and he just gave Shuichi a grateful bow and walked away in the same carefree manner.

Wow…the singer stood there, momentarily stunned. That had been way too easy. Tohma wasn't going to be there to be dead, so Eiri could never go psycho on him or anyone else. Speaking of the now 12-year-old boy, Shuichi wondered where he'd actually gone off to now…the singer giggled as he thought about Tohma getting distressed over Eiri not being in the park to meet him. Laughing, he congratulated himself.

"Are you done yet?" Turning around, he saw the boy facing him, eyebrows raised. He nodded sheepishly.

"Okay, good bye, forever, I hope…" The boy rolled his eyes skyward and was out of sight before Shuichi could say a word. Sighing, the singer turned to the streets, only to see the same men from before coming towards him with murderous looks.

"Hey, you, kid who ran us over, get over here…" Clearly ignoring the command, Shuichi started to edge away. "Hey! Kid! We're gonna teach you a lesson!" Just as he turned to run, a hand grabbed his arm, and he was thrown roughly to the ground.

A man towered over him angrily, almost radiating anger. The singer was sure that he'd been drinking; he was staggering pretty heavily on his feet, and unfortunately for Shuichi, his friends looked like they were in the same condition. The teen cringed as the man slowly reached his hand into his pocket, and…fumbled around for a second.

The look of anger turned to confusion. "Hey, where's my gun?"

Flash.

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"Shuichi! Get up already! We're going to be late!" Groaning, the singer pulled the blankets up over his head. Why was he always late when he woke up? He deserved a break after all that stupid running around he'd been doing lately.

"Five more minutes…" he moaned, snuggling deeper into the blanket, "I'm really tired this morning Yuki, leave me alone…"

"What the hell are you mumbling about? Get your ass outtta bed or we'll miss the lecture again!" A hand snatched the blanket off his warm body, leaving him shivering cold. As Shuichi lay there shaking, the words came through the misty half consciousness of the morning.

"Wait…wha…? Lecture?" There was a flash of red hair to his left, then he was assaulted by a bundle of clothes.

"Don't tell me you forgot about class again? Come on! Put those on and let's get going!" Now fully awake, or at least as wake as he'd ever be, Shuichi realized some very crucial pieces of information. Crucial piece of information #1: He was not in his room, Eiri's room, or any other room in Eiri's apartment for that matter. Crucial piece of information #2: He wasn't wearing any clothes. Crucial piece of information #3: Hiro, who was not dressed either, was standing in the room with him, staring expectantly. And finally, #4: There was only one bed in this room.

As is most likely obvious, being hit with all these facts at once is quite a hard thing to process. This is probably the reason for Shuichi attempting to jump out of bed, forgetting the issue of the sheets, and ending up flat out on the floor.

From his perch on a dresser, a half naked Hiro was laughing at him so hard that tears were streaming down his face. Disgruntled, Shuichi impatiently waited for the hysterics to stop. As the last giggles flew out of the redhead's mouth, Hiro wiped his eyes with the back of his hand and slipped off the desk.

"You're crazy, let's go."

Shuichi desperately wanted to ask where they were going, but keeping in mind the strange looks that he'd gotten last time that he didn't know something he should have, he stayed quiet. Instead, he obediently followed Hiro into what appeared to be the kitchen, and watching the red head carefully managed to gather together a decent breakfast.

"I thought you hated that stuff…?" Hiro gestured with a chopstick to Shuichi's bowl.

"Uh…well, I've decided to try it again," the singer laughed nervously, "Maybe I'll like it now…" No such luck. His first mouthful was so gross that he almost spit it out onto the table, but seeing as Hiro was watching him carefully, and he might not get another chance to eat today, Shuichi managed to choke down half a bowl before feeling sick.

Turning to Hiro's surprised face, he grinned weakly. "Mmmm…" Then he pulled himself to his feet and fled the room.

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"Alright Shuichi, get out of the bathroom, it's time to GO! Get a move on roomie!" The singer, who had been brushing his teeth frantically paused mid-brush. Roomie? So this meant…

Yes! That explained the nakedness! And who knew, maybe Hiro had another room somewhere in the apartment? As soon as he got out of the bathroom, he would check.

Unfortunately, his plan never went into action, because Hiro, finally becoming too impatient, body checked the bathroom door in just the right spot to make it fly open, exposing Shuichi, still in only his boxers, washing his face vigorously.

"Time to go," he announced, throwing a pile of clothes at the singer, "Put these on in the next ten seconds, or you're coming to class without pants…again." Without giving Shuichi a chance to wonder why _that_ situation had come up, Hiro sped out of the room.

"Ten seconds!" he called over his shoulder. "Starting now!"

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"Ah! Hiro, slow down, why are we going so fast?" Stumbling on the sidewalk, Shuichi managed to put himself even farther behind the red head who was flying at top speed in front on him. "Ow," he cried as he flew forward and landed on all fours on the sidewalk, scraping his hands and knees. "Hiro, wait!"

It was too late. By the time he hauled himself to his feet, there was no sign of his friend anywhere. Desperately, Shuichi flit around, searching for that glimpse of red, but he just couldn't locate his friend. If only Hiro had told him where they were going! Some…lecture or something, but that didn't really help at all.

Whatever, he couldn't stay here in the middle of the sidewalk all day. Hiro probably wouldn't come back, assuming that he knew where to go, so he should just get home…wherever that was.

Okay, scratch that plan. Next course of action should be to go visit the temple again. It seemed to be a point where Eiri (or at least the man's family) always turned up. But…he was almost afraid to go. Mostly he was afraid of finding out that he'd caused something really terrible to happen.

Although, he reasoned with himself, what could be worse than last time?

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"Hello? Anybody here? Eiri? Tatsuha?" Shuichi wandered around the edge of the temple's property, after having not been greeted at the door. Where was everyone?

"Eiri!" he called again, hearing strains of voices and music coming from the courtyard. "Eiri?"

"Heyyyyy!" Suddenly a bundle of energy tackled him to the ground, and Shuichi found himself looking up into the eyes of a blond child sitting on his chest. As he stood up, smiling at the child, a frazzled looking Mika rounded the corner.

"Eiri!" she admonished, "What are you doing to this poor man?" In response, the boy hugged Shuichi again, although not enough to knock him over this time.

"I'm really sorry," The tone of Mika's voice was warm and surprising, "My son usually doesn't act like this…Eiri, come on, let go!" It didn't take a genius to figure out that for some reason, this kid was named after his uncle. Probably because of the blond hair, Shuichi reasoned, trying to ignore the goose bumps he was getting.

"It doesn't look like he's going to let go," Mika laughed nervously, "Uh, well, I'm Mika, the mother of this misbehaving child!" The last comment was directed at the boy still wrapped around his stomach.

Shuichi stared down at the grinning child hugging him, and then back up at his mother. This was not the cold, calculating Mika that was married to Tohma. She seemed almost…happy, and was that a glow when she laughed? This was clearly someone who loved her life and her family.

Before the singer had time to wonder, a man walked out of the temple's door to the left. He came down to Mika and embraced her before turning to Shuichi. Was this the man that Tatsuha was talking about? The one that "saved" her?

"Hello," he said, in a friendly tone, "I don't believe we've met. I'm Douko. I guess you've already met my wife and Eiri. Can we help you?"

"Eiri just tackled this guy right outside the courtyard." Eiri sent a reproachful glance at his mother, who in turn shook her head at him.

"Oh," Douku looked down at his son. "Why?"

"He was calling me! I thought that we knew him! You know, sometimes I don't always know who I've met or not, there's so many people…" Eiri finished his sentence with a childish sigh, and flipped the hair out of his eyes in a manner frighteningly similar to that of his namesake.

"Actually, we haven't met," Interjected Mika, examining Shuichi with a strange look. "How do you know my son's name?" Instantly, the charming look on Douko's face disappeared, and he took on an intimidating air.

"What?" he frowned, drawing the boy closer to him.

"Oh…no, it's not…no…" Shuichi tripped over his words in an attempt to explain. "No, you see, it's not him, it, I uh, I know your brother." There was a sigh of relief from Douku, and then the man's attention seemed to wander amoung the many people in the courtyard. Apparently there was some sort of function going on today at the temple. Slowly, he drifted over to a couple standing by the food table.

"Oh," Mika's face softened, "You should have told me! He's here actually, around somewhere…" Mika looked around, and failing to locate her brother, turned to her son. "Eiri, go find uncle Tatsuha, okay? Tell him that his friend's here."

"Oh," Shuichi interrupted, "Actually, I was hoping to talk to Eiri?"

The suspicious look crossed her face again. "What? Why?" Subtly, she glanced around for her husband, who'd wandered off after hearing that Shuichi was a "friend" of his brother-in-law.

The little boy, still held in her arms, looked up at him curiously. "Why do you wanna talk to me?" He pouted, "You're making mommy nervous. She's holding my arms to tight…"

Mika started, and looked down at him apologetically. "Oops, sorry baby."

Shuichi shook his head again, wanting to intervene before things got out of hand. "Okay, I'm not here for _this_ Eiri, I'd like to talk to your brother." He waited for it to click. But something still wasn't getting through to Mika.

"I thought you said that you wanted to talk to Eiri." Her brow was wrinkled in a confused expression, not something that the other Mika would be caught dead doing.

"I do." What wasn't this woman getting? "Please, is he here?"

"For god's sake," she snapped, "He's right here."

"I want to talk to your _brother_ Eiri, not your son!" Almost instantly, Shuichi regretted the outburst, as some of the nearby people glanced over at them nervously. Unfortunately, it also seemed to frighten Mika even more, and she openly called over her husband, whispering something in his ear. Her eyes were filling up with tears, hands were visibly shaking.

Mika's husband turned to the singer. "Can we have a word?" There was a very serious expression on Douku's face as he led Shuichi into an empty room in the temple. They both took a seat calmly. "Okay, what are you doing upsetting my wife? This isn't good for the baby!"

"I'm sorry," bowing, Shuichi looked up with pleading eyes, "I didn't know that it would upset her! I didn't know that she was pregnant either, I never thought…well, never mind, but why is it that wanting to talk to Eiri would upset her? Hormones?" he added hopefully. That very familiar sinking feeling was returning to the pit of his stomach. What had he done now?

Douku sized him up suspiciously, and, seeming to confirm that he was telling the truth, began to speak.

"I guess you must be a friend from a really long time ago," Here, Shuichi nodded eagerly, feeling that it was the right thing to agree with, "So for some reason, you don't know…"

The man took a deep breath, and Shuichi desperately wanted to plug his ears; he had a terrible feeling about this. But he had to know. "Please, why can't I talk to him!"

"Because," began Douku, "Eiri died ten years ago."

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**Author's Note: ** Bwahaha! …sorry, I totally couldn't help it… J what's Shuichi going to do now that his lover is dead? Well, freak out of course. And more, next chapter…


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: **So, only three more chapters left (how exciting)…I actually feel terrible, because I totally let this story rot over the summer, and didn't even glance at it (although I didn't have a computer anyways) so I'm having a bit of a regaining-interest-in-my-own-story issue…whatever…eventually, I'll get it.

**Chapter Five: He's What?**

For a second, Douku's words didn't fully penetrate Shuichi's thought process. Then, as reality began to sink in, he realized that once again, things had only gotten worse. Why hadn't he stopped at Eiri hating him? At least he could have maybe convinced him…

No. That was why: he couldn't accept an imperfection. Which was exactly the issue that had started this whole mess in the first place. As soon as he figured this tangled web out, Shuichi vowed, he'd never take anyone for granted again.

Although, the way things were going, it didn't seem like anything was ever going to get back to normal, unless this was some crazy dream, and it felt way too real for that. "…oh god. Not again."

"I'm sorry?"

Shuichi looked up to see Douku's face peering down inquiringly at him. "Urgh…uh…can I have a minute?" The man nodded understandingly and left the room, softly shutting the door behind him for privacy's sake.

Inside, the singer sank to his knees, moaning out loud. "Oh shit…this is _not_ good. Ow…" He raked his fingers through his hair, catching a fingernail against his forehead and drawing blood. "Ow…I deserve it anyways…I can't believe that I actually thought that I could play God."

"Who are you talking to?" Somehow, in the middle of his tantrum, little Eiri had let himself into the room, and was now staring at the singer, probably thinking that he was completely insane. Nonetheless, he edged closer to the collapsed figure on the floor.

"Myself…that boy…I don't know," Shuichi confessed, "I messed up pretty bad."

"Yeah," with a plop, Eiri sat down next to him, "I've done that before too…but all you have to do is apologize, and you're okay!" he smiled cheerfully upset at the distraught boy on the ground in front of him, hoping that his advice would help.

The singer couldn't help chuckling weakly at this bit of wisdom. "Well, that theory doesn't exactly work when the person who you've hurt is dead…"

The boy turned to him with wide eyes. "You know a dead person?"

Should he tell him? He'd already led the boy into asking, so…"Your very own uncle in fact." It would almost be amusing to watch this kid's eyes get as big as saucers, had it not been for the situation. But as he said this, Eiri's eyes shrunk back down to normal size, and a smile flew to his face.

"Tatsuha's not dead, silly!" Eiri giggled cutely. "He's okay, really! Is that why you're sad?" He shook his head, "I even saw him today, just a while ago! He's leading a private sermon in the temple with some of the girls." Solemnly, the boy leaned over to Shuichi, whispering in his ear. "Sometimes, I don't really think that he's really preaching…but Mama asks me what else he would possibly be doing in the temple?" It struck Shuichi as odd, or maybe just incredibly normal, that Tatsuha would be doing something like _that_. Yeah, that was definitely the monk that he was used to.

Maybe he could go have a chat with the teen, see if he could find out some information about Eiri's death. Shuichi turned to his namesake.

"Uh, oh, well that's a relief that Tatsuha's not dead…uh, can you show me where that temple is?"

"Sure!" Eiri bounced to his feet, happy to help in that way that six-year-old children always are. "This way!"

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"So…Eiri…that's a nice name. Are you named after your uncle?" The boy twisted around mid step to look at Shuichi. Unfortunately, this resulted with him sprawled out on the ground, tripping the singer.

Eiri pulled himself into a sitting position, and examined Shuichi. "Uh, no, uncle Tatsuha's name isn't Eiri…it's Tatsuha." His exasperated tone was...well, exasperating.

Rolling his eyes, the singer pulled himself to his feet. "Yes, thank you. Hey, why does everyone assume that I'm talking about Tatsuha? I'm talking about your uncle Eiri." Although, it wasn't as though he actually expected the kid to answer the question for him. It was more like he was voicing his thoughts out loud for the world to figure out.

"Oh," the boy frowned, "Well, I don't have an uncle Eiri! I'm the only Eiri in this family. Maybe you're thinking of a different family?" Wow, this was really getting stranger by the minute. Clearly Mika had known who he was talking about, and Douku too, so why was this kid so confused? Shouldn't he at least know where his own name came from?

"What're you talking about? You must be named after him…you even look a bit like him. He had blond hair too."

"He did?...I mean…but I really don't have an uncle named Eiri. Mama says that I'm the only blond in the family. She wants me to dye my hair, but Daddy won't let her. He says to be proud with what I was born with."

Shuichi grinned. "It's true, you should. It's very nice hair."

Nodding, Eiri continued, "But maybe you're thinking of another family? Mama only has one brother: uncle Tatsuha. And Daddy doesn't have any brothers or sisters! Just like me. I'm an only child, but I won't be for long! There's a new baby coming; I'm going to be a big brother!"

"That's great Eiri…" In his head, Shuichi silently realized that this Eiri was probably the same age that his Eiri had been when Tatsuha had been born. Hopefully things would turn out differently for the next generation.

"We're here," the boy announced cheerfully, "Just go through those doors, and uncle Tatsuha will be waiting." He looked off back in the direction of the courtyard. "Now I gotta go back, Mama's probably looking for me…see ya later!"

Taking a deep breath, Shuichi walked up the steps of the temple, bracing himself to meet this version of Tatsuha. His hand hovered over the door; did he really want to do this? Who knew what terrible, depressed Tatsuha was sitting on the other side of the door? As the singer was in the middle of deciding, the door flew open, and a girl stumbled out, giggling.

"Thank you Father Tatsuha!" Her hair looked suspiciously rumpled, as did her crooked shirt. Hmm…that kid was pretty clever.

"Are you going to stand there all day?" A smirking Tatsuha shouted from his sitting position on the mat. "Let's get going girl!" Disgruntled, Shuichi walked in, glaring at the teen, who smoothly got to his feet to shut the door.

"So, what do you we have here? I don't think we've met honey, what's your name?"

"Shuichi." A flicker of doubt in the monk's eyes, and then Tatsuha smiled. "Come here Shu-chan."

"Shu-chan" cautiously stepped his way over the mats to the dark haired adolescent grinning up at him. To bad for the singer, he wasn't cautious enough, and Tatsuha's hand flew out to grab his crotch.

"Ow!" He tried to pull back, but the teen had a surprisingly good grip. Practise perhaps?

"Aha!" Tatsuha cried, "I knew that you weren't a girl! Of course, you can never be sure, you could just have been some flat-chested chick, but I just _knew_ it!" He released his handful, leaving poor Shuichi to attempt to massage some feeling back into his nether regions.

The singer fixed Tatsuha with a death glare. "And what I'd been a girl, what would you have done then?" Actually, on second thought, maybe he didn't want to know the answer to that question, considering the girl who'd left just before him.

A penseful expression crossed the monk's face. "Well, hmm…I guess I'd never thought that far."

"No kidding." Shuichi flopped to the ground unceremoniously. "So this must be a pretty sweet gig you got going on, pretending to be running a sermon while you're really seducing innocent girls…"

Tatsuha laughed. "Oh, they're not that innocent…after all, I advertise on the internet…hey, how'd you know anyways? You want in on it too?"

Instead of answering, Shuichi smiled, and shook his head at the ground. "Mika would love this…" Immediately, the teen went pale. "Uh...uh…you're not going to tell her about this…are you? Hey, who are you anyways, coming in here and threatening me? Just who do you think—"

"I'm not going to tell Mika…I just wanna talk."

"About what?" Tatsuha edged closer to the singer's mat.

"About Eiri."

"Uh, creepy? I don't think so…and leave my nephew alone!" An angry look jumped to the teen's face.

"_Why _does everyone think that I'm after a five-year-old? Do I look like that kind of person to you? You thought I was a freaking girl for god's sake, what does that tell you?"

Tatsuha laughed, relaxing. "Sorry man, it's just weird that you wanna know about him."

"I don't wanna know about _him_. I wanna know about your brother Eiri."

"I don't—oh…him. Why do you wanna know?"

"Well, er, I knew him, a long time ago – we went to school together – and I haven't seen him since, god, ten years ago, so I came to look him up, but that guy, Mika's husband, said that he was dead…"

"Er, yeah…well, I can't really tell you that much…um, he was like five when I was born, and at school most of the day, and when I was six, he got sent to boarding school for a year, which apparently didn't turn out too well, and then Tohma took him to New York…and that's all I know."

Shuichi groaned. Couldn't anybody in this entire place help him with anything? Maybe he could find Tohma. But he really wanted to find out something that he'd never thought to ask Tatsuha before, and now seemed like a pretty good time.

"Uh, Tatsuha, can you tell me something at least?"

The teen looked at him suspiciously. "Sure…"

"What was Eiri like when he was little?"

"Oh…um, well, like I said, I didn't see him too much….It seems weird, but I really didn't even know my own brother, and I didn't realize it until he'd left." Shuichi nodded sympathetically. It seemed like he'd been playing psychiatrist to Tatsuha way too many times in that past while, although, considering that most of the problems were his fault in the first place, it was the least he could do. "You know, I promised myself that when he came back, I'd make it up to him and try to be closer…but then he never came back, so…"

"Huh…" Shuichi watched him uneasily. Either the monk was going to burst out crying or laughing, judging by the strange expression on his face.

It turned out to be the latter. "Yeah, so you can see how that might be a problem…" Tatsuha managed through fits of hysteria. "Sorry, sorry, I know it's not funny, but it really happened a long time ago, like ten years ago, so I'm not so torn up about it…"

The shocked expression on Shuichi's face only sent him into more laughter.

"I just…sound so corny!" Tatsuha choked the words out, propping himself up against the wall. Not knowing what else to do, the singer waited somewhat uncomfortably until he was pretty sure that the teen could breathe, and keep a straight face.

"Okay, um, thank you, Tatsuha. Could you, maybe tell me where Tohma is?"

The grin was wiped right off of the other boy's face. "No; we haven't talked to him since he came back from New York without Eiri. Mika blames him, you know, clearly. Uh, don't bother asking her. She'll probably tear your head off…"

"Right…so you have _no_ idea?"

"Yeah, sorry man." A knock on the door drew his attention; a girl stood expectantly, attempting to contain a smile.

"Tatsuha-kun, I didn't know that you catered to such….broad varieties." She smirked evilly, an expression that seemed out of place on her extraordinarily innocent face.

Instead of denying it, the "monk" shrugged his shoulders indifferently. "Yeah, well…you know…" Shuichi felt his cheeks flame red, and knowing that it would be useless to stammer out an apology, fled the room.

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Shuichi managed to get back to the city with minimum difficulty, but finding that apartment again was hard. He wandered around for about an hour, and then thanks to a handy piece of id in his pocket, found an address. After that, it was just a matter of finding a cab driver to take him there, which took up quite a bit of time, considering that it was rush hour. Finally, he was wearily dragging himself up the stairs. At least he remembered the floor, after being dragged down the stairs by a frantically late Hiro.

All he wanted to do was collapse on a bed and sort through all this new information in his head. Then, hopefully, he'd get some sleep. It felt like he hadn't rested in days. Searching his pockets, he discovered that he didn't seem to have a key on him, so he settled for knocking on the door.

If Hiro wasn't home, he didn't know—

"Shu! Are you insane?" The door flung open, and a fuming red head reached out and tugged the singer in, slamming the door behind them. "Skipping again? That old bat was furious!" Hiro paced across the width of the room. "What were you thinking?"

Shuichi, finally recovered enough to be indignant, stood up defensively. "Well, after you ditched _me_, I got lost, because I had _no_ idea where we were even going, so I decided to go visit…an old friend."

"How did you get lost? We've gone the same way to school every single day since we started here!"

Shuichi took a minute to digest this information. "…school…huh…Hiro?"

"What?" The red head looked pretty angry, although it could just have been due to his tirade of the dangers of skipping class being interrupted.

"Why are we going to school?" Okay, so maybe it wasn't the most subtle approach that he could have used, but…"

Besides, Hiro was never one to appreciate skirting the matter. The guitarist in question now sank to sit on the bed, cradling his head in his hands. "Shu…we've been over this before! I thought we'd agreed on it…"

"Uh, remind me why again?" Perfect opening, right there, although he could see that Hiro didn't particularly want to talk about it.

The red head sighed. "Fine, but no more bringing it up for a while." When Shuichi nodded his head in assent, Hiro continued. "Okay, reason number one: we were never going to make it in the music business with connections. Reason two: My parents. Reason three: we decided to do this together! College life rocks, as we've discovered, plus we still get gigs from time to time anyways. Speaking of which, tonight, at that club near here, you know, the one you really liked, the manager wants us to do a few sets. I told him we'd be there at nine. Any question?" The sarcastic tone of Hiro's voice succeeded in deterring Shuichi from asking any thing else.

"Uh, nope…sounds good! Alright, I'm excited to play…um…it's just us, right?"

Hiro, who had been looking surprised to have won so quickly, recovered nicely to get a nicely confused look planted on his face. "…Duh…just like always…Shu, are you feeling okay?"

Shuichi laughed to himself, wondering how many times he'd heard that question in the past few days. If they could be called days…he really had no idea how much time had passed since the night of his party, if any had passed at all.

Unfortunately, laughing and talking to himself was not exactly at the top of Hiro's signs-that-your-friend-is-okay list. "Hey," he got up from his spot leaning on the wall, and sat down beside Shuichi on the couch, an arm causally thrown over his friend's shoulder. "What's really the matter?"

He was surprised when the singer turned suddenly and buried his head in his friend's neck. "Oh Hiro," he murmured softly, "You'd never believe me…"

"Try me." The comforting circles that his friend's hand was making on his back almost convinced him to do so. Almost.

"I'm sorry…I can't." Hiro heard his best friend's voice crack as he said this, and didn't push any further. Instead, he hugged Shuichi tightly; at least he could be some comfort, if not a confidante. The singer felt his friend's grip tightened, and despaired to be in such a situation that he couldn't tell his best friend what was wrong.

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"All right!" Shuichi jumped into the air, pumping his fist. "Bad Luck had arrived! The party can now start!" Few of the already slightly drunken bar patrons glanced up semi-curiously, and then went back to their drinks. Taking no notice of the complete lack of er, caring, Shuichi continued to go into an intricate celebration dance.

Amused, Hiro watched. There was no sign of the sniffling mess that his friend had been mere hours ago. _This_ was his Shuichi.

"…Wow," Shuichi was babbling on, "This is almost as exciting as the time that Yuki took me to the movies, and he brought me some popcorn, and…" His face fell for a second. "…oh Yuki…" Then his smile sprung back up, and the rant continued. Hiro tuned it out, vaguely wondering who "Yuki" was. Meh, probably some old family friend.

"Hey Hiro!" The manager of the club breathlessly ran up to the red head. "The other band cancelled, can you start in fifteen?"

"Uh, well, we're not really prepared—"

"Sure!" Shuichi cut it, "Let's go Hiro! Which was to the dressing rooms?" The manager stared at him, and then cracked up. "That way…" he managed to force out, after catching him breath.

Following his finger, Shuichi saw a sign that read "…Men's bathroom" Oh right…he'd forgotten the conditions they'd had get ready in. "Okay." The smile plastered back onto his face, the singer skipped off to the bathroom. Hiro watched him bouncing happily. "What a weird guy…" he sighed to himself, and then followed.

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After having gotten ready in record time, Bad Luck was waiting backstage for the last song to finish. Shuichi was particularly excited to play, and also incredibly grateful to the Suguru from his normal life, who'd insisited on Shuichi's learning the basic synth notes to most of their songs. Just in case, the young keyboardist had argued, Shuichi drove him to insanity, and he had to be committed. The singer made a mental note to give Suguru a big hug if he ever saw the normal one again.

It never really occurred to him that Hiro and himself may have written different songs with the different circumstances, until the guitarist asked him which song they'd start with, and listed off a bunch of random names for the singer to choose from.

Shuichi paled. The only ones that he recognized were Rage Beat, and the alternate name for a song that had been turned into Blind Game Again when Suguru had heard it played.

"Uh…" he turned to Hiro, "Let's start with Rage Beat…and how do you feel about some improvisation?

Before the guitarist could answer, a voice carried over the announcements. "And now….Bad Luck." Shuichi sighed. Even the announcer sounded bored. Some half hearted cheers and applauding could never discourage Shuichi, who ran onto stage excitedly, leaving a gaping Hiro to stand shocked, trying to understand his friend's logic, and as usual, failing miserably.

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"Hello everybody! I'm really excited to be here tonight!" Shuichi paused, waiting for a cheer that just wasn't happening. Damn, this was beginning to partially dampen his mood…slightly. Well, he could make the best of it at least, pretend that he hadn't gotten used to millions of fans screaming his name, pretend…okay, maybe he couldn't, but he could always pretend to pretend…er…moving along...

"The first song that we, Bad Luck, are going to sing, is Rage Beat! My best friend on the guitar, Hiro, and I, Shindou Shuichi, on vocals and synth, are going to rock out!"

"Oh my god, just get it over with…" A drunken murmer came from the crowd, accompanied by a feebly thrown bottle at the stage. Shuichi spared the energy to glare in the direction of the comment, and then immediately resumed his happy face.

"Leeeeet's go!" Hiro banged out the first few chords on the guitar, something that never failed to spark the hyperactive singer's blood. Then, he lost himself in the music.

As Shuichi's fingers flew over the keys, he winced slightly. The song just wasn't the same without Suguru's genius notes, but there was no way he could ever replicate those. The basic version was all he could manage. To compensate, he tried to put even more energy into singing that usual.

About halfway through the song, the door of the bar opened, and a very familiar figure lurked in. Shuichi was half-tempted to leap off stage mid-chorus, and run up to the man, but he'd have to leave it until later, considering that he'd probably scare the crap out of him. Still, he was distracted, and the last few lyrics were a bit off. Thankfully though, Hiro's solo followed, and he had time to pull himself together, and sneak another glance at the poised man sitting on a bar stool.

Then, the song picked up, and he had to leave those thoughts behind.

After what seemed like a century, it was over. Shuichi turned to the guitarist, expected a disappointed face after his performance, but instead Hiro's eyes were sparkling brightly. "Shu! How the hell did you learn how to do that? It was crazy! Amazing! Since when do you play synth like that?"

"…uh…a friend taught me…"

Hiro's eyes narrowed suspiciously. "What friend?"

"Um, I don't think you know him…"

"And he taught you between last Friday and tonight?"

Shuichi tried to nod nonchalantly, baring his teeth in an attempt to convey the intense level of his sincerity. Unknown to him, he looked like he was going through a torturous interrogation, and Hiro backed down quickly. Anything that caused his best friend so much pain wasn't worth pursuing.

"Okay, what should we play next?"

Hm…Shuichi racked through his mental list of songs. Which could be followed easily with guitar? Well, maybe they'd stick to Blind Game Again, and then go off into that tangent when they got there.

"Okay everybody, we're back!" There was a definite increase in interest this time, shown by the slightly more enthusiastic cheering, and the silence that fell over the bar when the singer was talking. He could see from his spot on the stage, the blond man was still sitting on the bar stool, but this time he had been joined by someone else…they looked familiar, but their face was still in the shadow.

"The next song we're going to sing is…" Suddenly, the man stepped out of the shadows, and Shuichi gasped. "Dyllon?" The sound echoed throughout the small room, and said man looked directly up at him, a confused look on his face.

"Er…yes, the name of the song is…Dyllon…heh…yes…" Shuichi shot an apologetic look back at Hiro, who gave him in return a pained, ever-suffering one, rolling his eyes finally and shrugging his shoulders.

"Um…enjoy…" Shaken, Shuichi stepped back from the tall mike to sit down at the keyboard. He scanned his head quickly for songs, and settled on Spicy Marmalade, in about three seconds. A stage whisper over to Hiro got the guitarist set for the positioning of the beginning of the song, and with an exaggerated finger flourish, Shuichi slammed his fingers down onto the synthesizer.

For the duration of the song, he kept an eye on the couple at the bar, who were still looking at him curiously. Oh, he'd love to go talk to them, and find out more about Eiri…he only hoped that they'd stay for the entire set.

It seemed his wish might come true. Dyllon was occasionally nudging his companion, Tohma, in the shoulder, whenever Shuichi would randomly add in the name "Dyllon" to his song, in an attempt to make it sound like a song that might have been named "Dyllon". For the blond's part, he was sitting forward in his seat, leaning in towards the band, a thoughtful look on his face.

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For the next half hour, Bad Luck played their hearts out on the stage, Shuichi playing the synthesizer notes from memory, and Hiro desperately improvising, but the crowd loved it. It was possibly the best that had ever played at the club, and the patrons knew that enough to appreciate it. By the end of their set, Shuichi had the crowd cheering everything that he spoke.

The two were standing backstage, drinking lots of water, and cooling off. "Wow, that was so much fun Hiro, I haven't done that in like…"

"A week?"

"…er, yeah, I guess…"

Shuichi made to walk away, but the guitarist grabbed his arm.. "Hey, what's with you Shu? You've been acting weird all day? You're not still mad about the whole college thing, are you?"

"No," the singer tried to smile in a reassuring way, "Really, that's not it. I guess I just woke up on the wrong side of the bed." He shrugged apologetically, "I'll be right back, I'm going to the bathroom."

Before Hiro could protest, he slipped between the curtains and jumped down from the stage. Instantly, he was greeted with congratulations from various members of the audience, and by the time he'd made it to the bathroom, his mood had improved drastically, which was good, because before he could walk in the door, a hand reached out and grabbed his arm, dragging him through the emergency exit, and into an alley.

"Hey!" he lashed out with his free arm, striking something soft. A loud "oof" came from his capturer. "Get awa…" He'd spun around, only to see an irritated Tohma glaring at him. "Er, sorry Seguchi-san…"

The annoyance was immediately erased off the blond man's face. "How do you know my name?" he asked, looking more curious than worried.

"Um…well…" Shuichi prodded his brain. Was this Tohma famous? No, he didn't think so, or else Tatsuha would have known something. Damn, he shouldn't have said anything.

"In fact, while you're at it, you can tell me how you know my boyfriend's name too. I know music, Shuichi, and I can tell an improvised song when I hear one, no matter how brilliantly it's faked. Actually, all your music was pretty much improvised wasn't it, besides the first song?"

The singer thought about arguing, but considering the scaryness factor of Tohma that he'd seen in the past, he decided to stick to half-truths if he could.

"Yeah," he admitted, trying to look ashamed, "We weren't really prepared."

"I thought as much. In reality, there was really one specific element of those songs that caught my attention, besides them being very nicely performed," Here, Tohma gave a gracious nod to the singer, "And that was the keyboard playing. How surprised I was that it sounded so familiar."

A cold sweat broke out on Shuichi's body. "Uh…heh…well, that's a funny story, you see—"

"—The only people that I know, that play keyboard like that," interrupted Tohma, "Are myself…and my young cousin. Since _I_ don't know you, I can only assume that you know Suguru-san, correct?"

Shuichi jumped at the explanation. "Yes! Yes, I do know him, oh, we're old friends…uh, how is old Suguru, haven't seen him in a while."

Instead of answering, Tohma continued to nod at him, half-smiling. "Yes…that would explain you knowing Dyllon, now would it. But I would have thought that Suguru would have told me if he knew such a talented band, knowing my profession and all."

The singer fought the urge to ask Tohma what his profession was, not wanting to get into another mess, but it was hard. "Um, yes, well, we weren't really that good when we knew him…"

"Hmm…" The look on Tohma's face clearly stated how he felt about that possibility, but Shuichi ignored it.

"Yeah, we knew old Suguru a whiiiile back…uh, like…a long time…ago…" he finished lamely, groping for words but sadly, finding none. "Uh…it was like—"

"So how would you feel about discussing a record deal?"

Shuichi's jaw dropped as he stared at the petit blond man. Was he completely serious? "Er…a what?"

"A record deal? You know, you come to a studio, sing, record, I sell your CD through the company, we both make money, is the idea ringing any bells?"

"Sure but…uh…oh. What company?"

"Traction Records."

Shuichi frowned; he'd never heard that name before, but maybe it was something new to this life, or maybe—

"Traction Records!" An excited whisper exploded from his ear, and he turned to see Hiro lurking right beside his face, watching Tohma with what could only be described as an incredibly thrilled expression. "Of _course _we'd like to discuss it!" His elbow connected with Shuichi's side. "Say yes!"

"Er…yes?"

"Perfect." At some point in time, Tohma had pulled out a small pocket book, and was now scrawling something down into a tiny margin. "How does 9:00 tomorrow morning sound?"

"Er…good?"

"Excellent." The blond glanced up at the stage with a disdainful look. "Well, there's really no reason for me to stick around here any longer. I will see you two tomorrow. Good bye." With that, he left Bad Luck half-stunned in the doorway of the bathroom, gaping after him.

"Um, Shuichi? What just happened?"

"…I don't really know…"

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Hiro and Shuichi burst in the door of their apartment, laughing hysterically. The excitement of receiving a record deal from Traction (the best company in Tokyo as Hiro patiently explained) was most definitely going to their heads.

After dancing around the rooms a few times (which really didn't take too long), they collapsed side by side on the couch, staring up at the ceiling and soaking in the moment.

"So…how are we going to celebrate?" Shuichi turned to the redhead, cheeks red with exertion.

"Hmmm…" Hiro smirked in a frightening way, "I can think of something we haven't done in a while…" He shifted closer to the singer, who blinked at him innocently.

"Okay, what?"

"Mmm…how about…this?" The guitarist slowly crawled over top of Shuichi until he was completely straddling the singer. "Don't you miss this?"

"Ermm…Hiro?" His cheeks were flaming red by now, and Hiro's breath so close to his neck wasn't helping either.

Suddenly, the redhead leaned down towards his lips, grazing them with his own, and bringing his hand down to Shuichi's—

"Ack!" The singer leapt of the couch, dumping his friend onto the floor. "What're you doing?"

Hiro looked at him for a few seconds with confusion. "What do you mean?"

"What's…all this?" Shuichi gestured around his head, presumably referring to the kiss.

"I'm sorry, I don't understand…? What's with you tonight? Usually you're up for a little fooling around after a night out…"

"I am? Er, yeah, with Yu—" Crap, he'd forgotten out that somehow, although how one forgets about their now dead boyfriend was beyond him. Why was he even having this conversation? He needed to get back to that room…er, go somewhere at least, that was private, and grab that boy! What was he thinking, putting him in all these crazy situations! Shuichi vowed that the next time they saw each other, that boy would get a piece of his mind…

"Shu? Shu? Are you in there?" The singer was snapped out of his thoughts by a hand waving back and forth in front of his face, something that was becoming a more and more common occurence.

"Uh, I have to go…to the bathroom…I may not be back…" Shuichi turned on the spot and sped towards the bathroom that connected to the bedroom, leaving a baffled Hiro staring at the spot where he'd just been.

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"Okay, I'm tired to this now, it's time to get back to normal," Shuichi shouted into the tiles of the shower, "I can't live the other Shuichis' lives, I want mine back! Please come get me, and I'll set things right! Pleeeease!"

"Okay, okay, just stop shouting, holy…" The singer whirled around to see the boy perched on the edge of the counter, repressing a smile. "Let's go." Without waiting for agreement, he jumped forwards and placed a hand on Shuichi's shoulder, fading the bathroom out.

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Hmm…the sight of New York City was beginning to look waaaay too familiar for his tastes, and hopefully this would be the last time that he'd ever have to see it. Was it just him, or was the air blurrier than last time?

Meh, chalk it up to the smog and keeping moving, then this nightmare will be over sooner.

"That's it, I'm done with this. Just take me back to the first place, and we'll get myself to go away." Shuichi glared over at the boy, who returned his look petulantly.

"And how are 'we' going to do that?"

"Well, you just have to tell him…me… that if I do this, Eiri's going to end up dead. Don't let me argue, just send me off…"

"So why am I doing this again?"

"Mostly because this entire mess is your fault in the first place. Plus, if he…I…see me, I'll probably freak out."

The boy considered him carefully. "Fine, I'll do it."

"Okay, let's go then."

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**Author's Note: ** Alright, so that's it for today folks, see you all on the reviews page :P


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six: The Last Save**

"Okay, wait here…" Shuichi bristled at the order from the young boy, but nodded and slipped off to the edge of the building anyways, finding a spot where he could watch without being seen.

"Fine…" he leaned against the wall petulantly, sending a wicked glare over at the boy, who didn't seem to see it and walked off in the opposite direction.

Okay, they were _so_ having a long conversation about a whole hundred many things when this was all over and everything was back to normal. God, normal…what was that again? Shuichi sighed and rubbed his temples with his fingers in frustration. Was this even happening? Maybe it really was just some totally wacked out dream that was just really…uh…really long. Oh! Maybe he'd gotten hit by a car, and now he was in a coma, and as soon as he accomplished his goal in this weird dream, he'd wake up and everyone would be standing around his bed like "Hey! He's not dead! Hey everybody, Shuichi's not dead!"….Well, everyone but Eiri. Eiri would probably back home sitting at his laptop. In a few minutes, he'd go hmm…I haven't seen Shu is a while, I wonder what he's been up to these past four months…?

Huh…that was either really funny, or really sad. Shuichi wasn't sure whether to laugh at the idea or cry because it might actually happen. Happily, he chose a muffled chuckle, which was rudely interrupted by the appearance of himself only a few hundred feet away.

Wow…did his hair really look like that from the back? He really needed to see a hair dresser. Soon though, all thoughts of his appearance were wiped from his mind, as he watched the exchange of words between the boy and himself. Unfortunately from a distance, he couldn't make out the words, but he could certainly imagine them in his mind:

Boy: "Uh, you told me to tell you to not do this."

Shuichi: "…what?"

Boy: "Um…let's try that again. You have to let Eiri go by; don't say anything to him"

Shuichi: "What? Why not? It's only a dream…"

Boy: "Well, um…yes, but if you do stuff in dreams it will affect your…singing voice."

Shuichi: "Really!"

_(at which point the present Shuichi winces) _

Boy: "Yes. Go home…"

Shuichi: "Well, okay, if you say so.

Shuichi watched as his former self turned around and walked back in the direction that he'd come, passing the younger Eiri further on down the road, and (here Shuichi congratulated himself) not even glancing at the blond boy.

"Go me!" Eiri cheerfully strolled up to the building and glanced around the entrance for a second, then entered the building with a little skip in his step. Knowing that he should go back and find the boy before things got out of hand again, but unable to tear himself away, Shuichi felt his gut constrict, and he couldn't stop himself from creeping closer.

Where had that boy gone? The singer needed to get back to his real home and continue his life. Hopefully he could apologize to Eiri for the disastrous party, and get back into the author's good graces – although the question of whether he owned good graces was sketchy.

Suddenly, a loud burst of noise caught his attention, and he dove back into the shadows. From around the corner of the apartment building came those same three guys that he had run into twice before, still staggering along down the street. Shit, if they caught him, they'd definitely go crazy. And that angry looking one talked about having a gun…

An dreamlike feeling came over him as those men walked up to the building that Eiri had just entered, comparing it to a slip of paper they held in their hands. No…there was no way…this couldn't be…

"…the right place?"

"…Kitazawa….address…for me…"

It was.

Shuichi hovered by the door, on the verge of indecision. He'd promised to let everything be, not to mess around anymore with Eiri's life. But it was so tempting. Eiri was so close to him. If he just helped him – it wouldn't take a lot – things really could get better. Tohma wasn't there to get shot, Eiri would be okay, he just had to save the boy from his evil teacher, and all would be good.

He knew that he shouldn't do it. But somehow, that just wasn't enough. With one last sigh for what he was going to do, Shuichi raced into the building after the blond boy.

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Shuichi blindly followed his way up to the room, listening to the voice of the men who were merely a few flights of stairs above his head on the staircase. If any of them looked down…

No, he wouldn't think of that…or that fact that he was getting himself into the worst trouble that he'd managed yet in this little…excursion of him. Nope, all he would concentrate on for the moment was going to be rescuing Eiri.

He was thinking a little, rush in, grab the kid and run, or maybe a little…uh…rush in, distract them, grab the kid and run.

…Okay, so formulating plans wasn't his strong point, but seriously! Who actually had the time to figure out a plan? He was a little preoccupied at the moment.

The men finally entered the hallway, after going up what felt like thirty sets of stairs. Shuichi waited outside the doorway for them to approach the door of the room, and then slowly tiptoed down the hallway as a shaky hand admitted them to the room.

Alright, he was totally going with plan A. It was the shortest plan, and it had a nice, non-failure ring to it. Yes, plan A was definitely the way to go…unless plan B was. Um…best not to think about that. Shuichi took a deep breath, drew himself up, and knocked on the door firmly.

"What the…?" Angry voices came from inside. There was rustling movement, and some cursing loudly, and then the door opened a fraction of an inch, revealing an eye that Shuichi had only ever seen in a ten-year old picture.

"Can I help you?" The words were so slurred that it took the singer a moment to sort through them. "Hello? Buddy? Do you understand?"

Shuichi cleared his throat. "Ah, I'm looking for a little boy, Eiri Uesegi?"

The man's eyes narrowed suspiciously, and the his speech became more distinct. Behind him, two more heads appeared, glaring at him. Then, a flash of recognition. "Hey! There's that punk kid again!" The door shut for a second, and then flung open, letting the three guys run out at them. Well, Shuichi just about had a heart attack, but thankfully for him, these guys were pretty drunk, and he was able to duck under their arms and run into the apartment.

"Eiri! Eiri! Where are you?" There was no answer, but a soft sobbing noise came from his right. Turning into one of the rooms, Shuichi slammed the door behind him and saw the tiny figure of Eiri curled up in a corner, tears streaming down his face. "Are you okay?" Eiri looked up at him, alarm written all over his face. "It's okay, I won't hurt you. I'm a friend of Tohma's."

Eiri's eyes brightened for a second, and then he nodded his head slightly, face crumpling. "They said…they said that they were going to…going to…" A ragged sob was torn from his throat, and he plunged his head back into his lap, crying loudly.

The voices of the men came back in full volume. They all sounded slightly disoriented. Shuichi wondered why they hadn't come barging into the room, and realized that in their drunken state, they probably had no idea what room to look in. Well, all the better for him; he jumped up and locked the door, pulling up a chair and sticking it under the handle for extra security.

Now he could turn his attentions back to Eiri. "Hey," he whispered softly, "Eiri…they didn't…do anything to you…did they?" The scared look on Eiri's face threw him into a panic for a moment, then the boy choked out a firm no.

"Alright," Shuichi tried to smile encouragingly, but it was hard given the dreadful banging that the door was now recieiving. Apparently they'd been found out. "It's okay, we're gonna get out of here just fine, okay?"

Calmness was not easy, but of course, necessary. The banging continued for a few minutes, but Shuichi wasn't particularly worried about them ever breaking down the door, considering it was one of those heavy steel doors that only ever seemed to be found in New York. Eventually the men realized that too, because they stopped pounding the door, and began calling inside to them.

"You'll never get out of here, you'll have to come past us first, and we'll be waiting!"

"Oh, that's original," Shuichi muttered under his breath, "Do you write your own material?" But then Eiri gave him a strange look, and he realized that it wasn't exactly the appropriate time for sarcasm.

"How are we gonna get out of here?" The look of Eiri's face was terrified, exactly how the singer was sure that his looked at the moment. Struggling to pull himself together, Shuichi's eyes landed on the window overlooking the street.

"Hey…is that a…" It was almost too good to be true, "…a fire escape?"

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Five minutes later, Shuichi was helping Eiri climb out onto the rickety fire escape as quietly as possible. Looking down, he noted that they weren't exactly as high as he'd thought, thankfully, because heights didn't seem to be Eiri's thing, judging by the green look on the boy's face. Although, that could always be from the getting-attacked-by-perverts aspect of the day…

"Okay, let's go, careful…" Shuichi couldn't imagine the world he'd wake up in if he let Eiri fall to his death from the fire escape.

Slowly, they made their way down the unsturdy metal structure, picking their way around broken beer bottles and missing steps and hazards like that. They'd almost made it to the bottom, when a shout broke out form above, and looking up, they saw a wobbly figure leaning out the main room window of Kitazawa's apartment. Oh, please, Shuichi prayed, do not let those drunks actually attempt to climb out on the fire escape…it may be disastrous.

Fortunately, his prayer was answer, because the head disappeard back inside the building and no shaky feet were stuck out the window afterwards. But it also meant they'd have to go faster, because the men were almost certainly running down the main stairs by now. Shuichi nudged Eiri's back to make him go a little faster.

Finally, finally their feet touched solid ground again, and they bolted off around to the other side of the apartment, headed towards the streets, take comfort in the many people milling about. They had to be safe here; no one could attack them with so many witnesses. Up ahead, Shuichi saw a taxi pull up to the curb, and out stepped Tohma. Giving him absolutely no time for reaction, the singer tackled the blond man back into the car, pulling Eiri along behind him, and slammed the door shut.

"Go! Fast!" he ordered the cab driver, voice strained from the stress. The man, perhaps used to such dramatic situations, reacted wonderfully, and pulled away from the curb just as the three men poured out of the building onto the concrete, looking around anxiously. The taxi cab blended into the traffic perfectly, and surrounded by a hundred other cars of the same colour, Shuichi finally felt safe.

Flash.

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Hmmm…this was a nice bed actually, compared to the hard rock he'd woken up on last time. It was the idea of what…or who…might be in the bed that freaked him out so much. Maybe a protest was in order. He wouldn't open his eyes until –

"Wake up sleepy head!" Well, there's as good a reason as any. Shuichi tentatively peeked open his eyes to see a cheerful girl standing in the doorway of yet unknown bedroom. A tray laden with various breakfast foods was balanced precariously on her hand, held high above her head for a reason that he couldn't imagine.

"I made you breakfast in bed!" Okay, what was with all the people wanting to feed him! God, if only Yuki was like this.

"Oh…um, thanks you…" Instead of supplying her name like Shuichi was implying, she grinned even wider and bounced down on the bed, plopping the tray into his lap. He winced as some of the orange juice spilt onto his shirt. "Ermm…what is it?"

The smile never wavered. "It's a new recipe I'm trying, called pork a la mode!"

"Huh…" Shuichi wasn't very good at French, but that didn't like a good thing…" Actually, I'm not really hungry right now…"

"Oh…" Her face fell so quickly that he immediately added, "Well, but it looks so good that I have to try some!"

"Okay, but eat up quickly honey, we're going to be late for the wedding! You have to drive me to the hair place by 11:00!"

Honey? Wedding? Hair place? Full sentences? Once again, Shuichi found himself victim to a black hole of understanding, but that was okay. Well, alright, so it wasn't really okay, but it could be just for today…uh…yeah.

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"Right, so where is this hair place again?" Thankfully, not thinking that it was a strange question, the girl, who Shuichi had subtly discovered – which meant digging through her purse when she was in the bathroom – was named Saki, cheerfully read him the directions from a piece of paper. Fortunately for the singer, he knew where the street was, so after that it was just a matter of finding the right address.

"Thanks honey!" Saki hopped out of the car with a flounce. "The other bridesmaids are picking me up and driving me there, so you can go home if you want! Just remember to be there by 1:00, that's when the ceremony starts. Okay?"

"Okay…"

Instead of driving off while she disappeared into the building, Shuichi opted to stay in the parking space and think things over. So far what he'd discovered was:

1. Clearly, Saki was his girlfriend.

2. Clearly Yuki wasn't his boyfriend. Which wasn't good, because that meant that he was somewhere off on his own, probably vulnerable to the clutchs of all the evil—

Okay, enough with the list, it was just depressing. Disregarding the list, they were going to a wedding today, although he wasn't sure whose, and apparently Saki was good friends with like, the sister of the bride or something.

Huh…Shuichi leaned over, noticing that Saki had left her purse on the floor of the car, which wasn't surprising considering how air headed she had been in the past few hours he'd spent with her. She was like…the female version of himself, which made him feel ironically responsible to be the mature one for once. Maybe he should take the purse in to her, she'd probably need it to pay.

As he stepped out of the car, a lime green leaflet of paper slipped out from a pocket and fell to the ground. Curiously, he picked it up and flipped it over, reading the front with apprehension.

"_You are invited by the Intrepid Noriko and her accomplice Mika to come to…"_

Hmm….must be the wedding invitation. Shuichi couldn't imagine Mika ever agreeing to be featured on the front of a card like that; Noriko must have made it without approval.

"Shu! Have you seen my—oh you found it!" A strong pair of arms tackled him to the ground, hugging the air out of his lungs, "Thanks so much!" Saki snatched her purse and the invitation out of his hands and ran back into the building, calling over her shoulder, "See ya later!"

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Back at the apartment – which Shuichi had managed to find due to his recent practice in remembering his newest home – the singer collapsed on the couch. If this ever ended, he could come up with a realllly good song about the entire experience…or maybe tell Yuki about it and get a book written about it. That'd be pretty cool.

Speaking of Yuki, that was the next pressing issue on the agenda: how to track the author down. His first plan of action should be to search his own apartment. Shuichi hauled himself to his feet, sighing loudly. This was going to be a long day.

Actually, it wasn't that long. Shuichi had only been searching for about two minutes when he found a page with partial lyrics scribbled down on it, then a CD with his face that looked only slightly different from his original first one. Playing the CD, he searched the rest of the apartment, and discovered multiple videos of theirs, randomly splayed out around the rooms. Apparently Saki was a fan; she had an enormous full-sized poster of himself on her wall.

It seemed like he still had his old job back at NG Records, which was a relief after the last little incident, but whether anything else was the same was unclear. Shuichi shuddered, thinking of the aggressive Ryuichi that he'd encountered at the beginning of this insane nightmare.

Well, was it a nightmare really? If it ever ended, it would be an interesting look at how things might have happened, and what things could still happen…maybe. All this thinking was hurting his head, so Shuichi settled down into the couch and turned on the TV, vowing to continue his search in a while.

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Strangely, or maybe not…the best piece of evidence he could have found was gathered from his cell phone , which had rung rudely in the middle of his search, interrupting a particularly thorough look through his….fridge.

Finally tracking down the source of the annoying ringing, Shuichi flipped open the phone and held it to his ear, eyes still roving around the room. "Yes?"

"Shuichi?" The singer almost dropped the phone in shock.

"Mika?"

"Who else would it be? I was just wondering if Saki had left yet." In the background, Shuichi could hear the various yelling and noises that were generally associated with weddings.

"Oh, um I dropped her off at the hair place at 10, what time is it now?"

"Almost 12:30, she should have been here by—oh! Saki, hi! I'm just talking to Shuichi." The singer could hear the intelligible voice of the girl giggling and replying something that was most likely really sappy and cute.

"Okay, well thanks anyways Shu," the singer frowned at the cutesy nickname, "I just want everything to be perfect for my brother's wedding…"

Shuichi gulped nervously. "Uh, when you say 'brother', you mean Tatsuha…right?"

Mika laughed loudly, not something that he'd heard often, unless it was mocking him. "Of course not, he's only sixteen for god's sake!"

"Well…you don't have an older brother that I don't know about, do you?"

"What's gotten into you Shuichi? I thought you were happy for Eiri!"

Damn. Damn. Damn. Damn. "Er, haha, of course I am, just kidding around, um, gotta go, laundry's buzzing….BUZZZ oh, there it goes again…bye!" Slamming the cell phone shut, Shuichi threw it onto the couch and began to pace the room frantically. Okay, so he should have known better. In fact, he did know better…if only he'd listened to himself! Oh Eiri, how does he get himself into these messes? Or more accurately, how does he get Eiri into these messes?

An idea occurred to the singer, and he dove onto the sofa and grabbed the phone, flicking onto the address book. Eiri, Eiri…Eiri…and …

Oh god….

Eiri and Ayaka.

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Oh god. He should have known that something like this would happen if Eiri was left to his own cheerful devices for ten years…without that terrible broody cloud above his head, he probably didn't have the heart to refuse when his father engaged him to that needy chick.

The new Eiri was probably a well-mannered, gentle, kind, caring…well, let's just go with a better person. And that evil Ayaka had taken advantage of him! How dare she…

Clearly, something had to be done. Shuichi checked his watch: 12:30. He still had time to make it to the wedding, and….well, he didn't really have a plan at the moment, but he was sure that it would come to him on the way. If all else failed, he could always grab Eiri and run; it hadn't turned out too badly the last time.

Grabbing his cell phone and the car keys off the couch, Shuichi dashed out the door, barely remembering to lock the door behind him. Someone stepping out of the next apartment threw themselves against the wall as he sped by, perhaps mistaking him for an errant freight train.

The singer reached the parking garage, barely in one piece. His hair stuck to his forehead in a terribly frightening way, and his entire face was beet red, which he noticed as he jumped into the car. Shuichi started up the car and pulled out onto the road in under a minute, narrowly avoiding a mother pushing her baby around in a carriage.

"Sorry," he yelled out the window, then turned back to the matter at hand. What was the fastest way to get there? Actually, where was there? Damn it! As he turned onto the on-ramp of the highway, Shuichi fumbled around in his pocket and brought out his cell phone. Scrolling down the address book, he picked Eiri's number.

"Come on, pick up, pick up, pick—"

"Shuichi?" The sound of Eiri's deep voice came over the phone, and the singer almost fainted at the wonderful sound of it. He hadn't heard the man say anything that wasn't angst ridden and unhappy since…well, it was probably the night before Shuichi's surprise party, when the singer had come home early, and –

_So_ not important at the moment.

"Shuichi, you there?"

The singer licked his lips and cleared his throat. "Uh, hi, Eiri…um—"

"Dude, where are you? Saki is freaking out, she's been running from room to room for about an hour now, looking for you…I'm hiding out in some room, because Mika somehow thinks this is my fault…something about a weird phone call. Even Mizuki is looking for you; she can't stand anything that's not on time…but whoever finds you first, you're in trouble…" Eiri laughed lightly, and Shuichi almost swooned again. This sounded like the perfect Eiri! He even laughed, and so easily too. Usually it took the most ridiculous things to make him laugh, and unfortunately a lot of them involved him at the bottom of a set of stairs.

"Uh, my car's got a flat, so I took a taxi, but I don't remember the exact address, so…"

Eiri laughed again, "Okay, well it's at the temple, but…one second, do you have some paper?" Shuichi nodded, but realizing that he was not visible, assured the man that he did in fact have some. As Eiri rattled off the address, the singer sighed, basking in his voice. He was almost positive that he'd never heard his boyfriend say so many words to him at one time. Actually, this may be the most amount of words that he'd heard Eiri say to anyone since he knew him.

"Got that?"

"Oh, yeah thanks." Shuichi turned into the lane that would take him to the road near the temple. "Perfect."

"Great, okay, I have to go, I think I hear Mika…"

"Wait!" Eiri waited. "I was just…um…wondering…er, are we friends?"

There was the sound of the man exhaling on the other end, most likely in frustration, but to Shuichi's delight, unlike the normal Eiri would have, this one didn't snap at him and hang up without answering. "Of course, what kind of question is that?"

Shuichi giggled nervously, "Um, are we really good friends?" Shuichi, subtlry is thy name.

"Yeah, I'd say so, considering we've known every day since you started working with Tohma…"

The singer drove in silence for a moment, trying to plan out how he would launch his next attack.

"Uh, Shuichi, I should really—"

"You don't have to do it!" The words flew out of his mouth before he could stop it, "I know your dad made you do it, but we can fight him! We've done it before, and we could do it again, just get up and ran and never come back!"

"What are you—"

"Just like we did that time, remember," Shuichi was struggling to keep his tears in, knowing that Eiri would never believe it, "Remember…?"

"I don't know what you're talking about! Shuichi, I don't have to do what? What time?"

"Don't you remember me," A sob escaped before he could repress it, "We got away, that time in the apartment, when Yuki tried to hurt you, but I came and saved you, do you remember me now?"

There was a sharp intake of breath on the other side of the line, and Eiri tried to say something, but he was interrupted once again by Shuichi's rant. "I saved you! We climbed out the fire escape and ran and ran, and we got away. We could get away again, just us two, and you won't have to listen to your father, or get married or anything, and it would be…" The singer was unable to continue.

"Shuichi…is that was this is about? You don't think that I want to get married? Because–"

"You should be marrying _me_!" As soon as the words were out of his mouth, the singer winced. Probably not the best strategies to use right now, but he'd said it, and there was really no way that Eiri hadn't heard, considering the volume at which he'd screamed it.

"I should marry _you_? What? Uh, maybe we need to have a little chat about—"

"I love you Eiri," he whispered under his breath, then strengthened his voice, "Don't worry! I'm coming to save you!" Before the writer had a chance to respond, he ended the call and threw the phone onto the seat, applying more pressure to the gas pedal under his foot.

On the other end of the line, a very confused Eiri was left holding the phone up to his ear, scratching his head.

"Who was that?" Tatsuha appeared at the doorway, grinning widely. "Some pissed off chick you ditched for Ayaka? Sounded like quite the conversation…" He shut the door quietly behind him, presumably to avoid catching the attention of Mika.

Eiri shook his head with slowly, "No…it was Shuichi…"

"Shuichi? But…you and him…?"

"No!" Eiri shouted, treating Tatsuha to his famous death glare, and then stopped, and lowered his voice, "That's what I can't figure out. He sounded really messed up, and he was talking about something that he couldn't have kn…never mind. Maybe he's just sick or something…"

"Oh, that's weird, you know Mika said that she had the strangest conversation with him this morning; maybe he has a fever or hit his head running into the wall again, or something like that…"

"Yeah," murmured Eiri, staring pensively at the wall, "Maybe…"

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Shuichi tapped the steering wheel of the car nervously. Who was this person in front of him? What kind of ridiculous speed were they going? At this rate, he'd never make it to the wedding on time. In fact, it was already five to one, and the temple was no where in site.

Finally making a decision, he pulled out and sped by the slow moving vehicle, glancing over only once to see the old lady's face with the most incredibly shocked look on it. What? It wasn't that terrible that he'd passed he—

HONK! HONK!

Quickly, Shuichi swerved back into his lane, narrowly missing not only the oncoming traffic but the little old lady in her car. After that, he tried his best to keep his patience.

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**Author's Note:** Hey, phew, that was the second to last chapter :) I'm happy it's almost over, but truthfully I'll be a bit sad then too...anyways, please review and tell me what you think :P

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	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven: A Relevation**

Eiri sat at his dressing table, studying his reflection in the mirror. What was with Shuichi saying he didn't want to get married? Of course he wanted to, they'd been planning this for years for god's sake, so why would his friend even say something like that? There was something strange going on with that kid, like the whole, 'you have to marry me' thing! What was _that_ all about? He'd known the singer for long enough, and he'd never gotten any inkling of a feeling that he was attracted to Eiri.

And how could he have known about that day? Eiri had never told anyone about that, even Tohma hadn't believed that there had been another person there, he thought that Eiri had been so stressed and full of adrenaline that he'd done the entire thing himself, that it was Eiri who had tackled him back into the car, but couldn't believe that he was capable of that, so had invented some random boy that had come to save him. Well...at least that's how the psychiatrist explained it, so that's what Tohma was going with apparently. No matter that there was no way that Eiri could have knocked him over with that much force, no matter that Tohma had been shoved into the car about thirty seconds before Eiri had jumped in himself, no matter that _someone_ had been sitting directly on top of Tohma while Eiri was hiding under the seat.

Regardless, it wasn't something that he liked to think about, much less talk about, so how could Shuichi have known about that? Leaning his forehead into his hands, he stared long and hard into the mirror, trying to command his memories to become more clear.

"_It's okay, I won't hurt you. I'm a friend of Tohma's"_

_A flash of pink_

"_They didn't hurt you, did they?"_

_A strand of pink fell into a smile_

Eiri groaned and clutched his head. Why couldn't he remember that boy's face. All he could think of was pink...pink hair? Well, the only other person he'd ever known with pink hair was Shuichi, but it couldn't have been him. He could at least remember that the boy who rescued him was, or seemed a lot older than he was.

"_It's okay, we're gonna get out of here just fine, okay?"_

_Violet stars..._

Pink hair and violet eyes. There was honestly no other person in the world who looked like that. Eiri shook his head violently, trying to dislodge the confusion. Maybe he was placing Shuichi's characteristics onto the boy's face, because he was associating the singer with the incident after his weird outburst. Yeah, that sounded logical.

"_There was no one else there Eiri, just you. You did it yourself, there was no boy."_

"_But Tohma! I saw him, he had pink hair!"_

"_There was no boy Eiri. End of discussion."_

Damn. This was SO not the thing to be thinking about on his wedding day. Maybe later he'd take the singer aside and have a talk, depending on if Shuichi ever arrived, and what condition he was in.

"_It's okay, I won't hurt you. I'm a friend of Tohma's"_

"_I don't have any friends with pink hair Eiri, that's just tacky."_

Argh! What was that boy's face? If only he could remember one thing, he would be able to picture it in his head, but whenever he closed his eyes, Shuichi's face floated there, grinning at him.

"_Go! Fast!" Hands helping him climb out the window, shoulders bumping as they ran down the fire escape, feet hitting the ground beside his as they jumped off the fire escape and ran to the car. _

_Pink hair flashing in front of his eyes._

_A face—_

"Eiri!" Startled, the writer jumped up out of his chair, tangled in a bouquet, and ended up flat out on the ground. "Eiri, are you still in there? Come on! The ceremony is starting!"

Shit. Dusting himself off to make him look presentable, Eiri checked his appearance one more time in the mirror, avoiding his own eyes, and then went out to meet Tatsuha, the ring bearer.

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Shuichi ran through the garden of the temple, desperately following the noise of the music until he rounded a corner. Finally, FINALLY, there was Eiri, looking wonderfully healthy, and...happy? The writer hadn't seen him yet; all his attention was focused on the woman standing in front of him, her flowing wedding dress accentuating her beauty further. Shuichi took another step in their direction, eyes on Eiri the entire time, and suddenly, the man smiled at her, so spontaneously, and hugely that the singer was shocked. He'd never seen that smile before, ever, in the entire time they were together.

Ayaka leaned over and whispered something in his ear, and he threw back his head, roaring with laughter. It was such a beautiful sight, just watching him made Shuichi want to smile, but cry at the same time, because he knew that now, there was no way that he could stop the wedding and run away with Eiri. Eiri didn't want to get away. He was actually _happy_ here, like this. Without Shuichi.

How could this have happened? Was it Shuichi who made him angry and sad in the first place? Why couldn't Eiri just be satisfied with him? What was wrong with him?

Now he had a chance to make it up to the writer. He could let him be happy, here, now. Shuichi just had to walk away, and Eiri would finally get to laugh and smile like a normal person, and he could have a wife he loved, and kids that he could take care of, and it was be a much better life than anything that Shuichi could ever give him.

Tears started to gather in the singer's eyes, but he viciously blinked them back. He had to be strong for Eiri; no tears or fuss, just leave him alone and don't ever mention anything about it. Shuichi laughed; he'd finally found the perfect way to make Eiri happy, but it came only with somebody else. It was a terrible, ironic situation, but he'd finally succeeded, so he didn't intend to change anything else. This was as good as it was going to get for Eiri.

Surveying the party, Shuichi saw Mika snuggled up to Douku, smiling up at him, with one hand resting on her son's head. He vaguely wondered what the boy's name was now. Over by the coffee, Tohma stood talking to someone animatedly, his entire face lit up. When he craned his neck, the singer saw that he was talking to Dyllon, and at that moment, Tohma leaned over and planted a quick kiss on the man's cheek, then turned away, blushing.

Everyone was happy. It was perfect. Maybe he could learn to live with Saki, if only for a while; he didn't want to ruin her life either. But this was a good place; he had his job that he loved, his friends were happy, and most importantly, Eiri was happy.

Wanting to give himself time to recompose himself, the singer tried to sneak away unseen, but suddenly he was attacked from all sides by a horde of angry girls.

"Shuichi! Where were you? You are _so_ late!" Saki jumped onto his arm, whining pitifully, "You left me all alone here, I was so sad, you promised that you'd be on time!"

Mika stormed around at his other side. "Shuichi! God, you can't just make up stupid excuses and hang up on me!" A bright red flush worked its way up her face, "I thought you were going to come and do something stupid."

The victim on the onslaught tried to mumble apologies and get away quickly, but it was too late; he'd been spotted by Eiri, and now the man was coming over to say something. Judging by the look on his face, he wasn't exactly thrilled with Shuichi.

"Oh...uhoh," Dragging a heavy Saki along behind him, Shuichi attempted to run into the house, but found that she was planted firmly into the ground. "Come on, let's go...in here..." he mumbled, but turned around and found himself face to face with Eiri. As if on que, the girls immediately fell silent.

The man stood in front of him in silence for a moment, studying him thoughtfully. A strange look of recognition flashed across his face, but then Eiri shook his head with the slightest flick, and extended a solemn hand to Shuichi, offering a silent pact. The singer took it gingerly, and they shook, never breaking eye contact.

When Eiri dropped his hands away, he immediately adopted a more causal manner for the benefit of the girls who were all looking between them and at each other curiously. "Glad you could make it Shuichi."

"I'm happy to be here, congratulations to both of you," he nodded towards Ayaka, who had come up beside Eiri, "I'm not feeling very well, I think I might go sit inside for a little while..."

Mika started to say something, but the author nodded seriously, "Okay, thank you for coming anyways, maybe you'll feel better later:.."

Shuichi managed a weak nod before he bolted inside, searching out the bathroom.

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"What was with you today?" Saki asked, for about the millionth time, as Shuichi parked in the basement level of their apartment building and they both climbed out of the car. For the millionth time, Shuichi avoided the question, mumbling something about a headache and running into a wall.

Just as it looked like she was actually going to demand a real answer, the singer's cell phone rang, saving him from what was going to most definitely be an awkward conversation. "Uh, one sec," he fumbled the phone open, checking the call id. "Hey Hiro." With a small waving motion, he gestured for Saki to go on without him, smiling apologetically and blowing her a quick kiss. This seemed to placate her, as she grinned back at him and skipped her way to the elevator.

"Hey Shu, how are you feeling?"

Saki was finally out of sight; he could drop that pathetic grimace of his face. "Oh god...terrible." He knew that he really shouldn't provoke a conversation by complaining, but it was too tempting to complain.

Hiro clucked his tongue sympathetically. "It was that bad?"

Shuichi frowned, "What was that bad?"

"The wedding? Man, I can't believe you agreed to go; it must have been torture!"

This was definitely weird. Was Hiro just sympathizing because weddings in general were tough, or was it because he knew something else...?

"Did you get a chance to talk to Eiri about...uh, you know?"

"Er...no, I don't know, but I did talk to him briefly. What are you...?" An idea dawned onto Shuichi. "Oh, but Ayaka was there..."

"Oh man, that really bites. I know how you feel about him; I was hoping you'd get a chance to tell him."

Aha! Shuichi should have known that he wouldn't have just been lurking around in this world without having feelings for Eiri! It was just a given... slightly pacified from his earlier despair, the singer smiled for real for the first time in hours.

"Well, I was just phoning to make sure that you were okay, and, you know, didn't do anything stupid..." Hiro chuckled evilly.

"Hey! I never do anything stupid...er...okay...point taken. I'll see you...oh, by the way, when's our next practice?"

"Uh, I was thinking about having one Saturday morning, how does that sound?"

"Great, does Suguru know yet?" Shuichi laughed at himself, thinking about the question, "God, what'm I saying? He'll probably be there anyways, prowling the hallways...waiting for someone to come practice with him. Poor guy...I guess we should probably let up on him a bit..."

There was only silence on the other end of the phone. Shuichi twitched uncomfortably, getting a bad vibe out of the situation. In his head, he urged Hiro to laugh and answer, making some snide comment about the keyboardist's work habits. Or his meticulous work space. Or his insistence on doing every single piece over until it was perfect. Anything, at this point, would be nice.

"Um, sorry? Are you feeling okay?" Well, that was probably about the ten millionth time right there. It practically warranted a party.

"Yes," he replied firmly, then giggled, "Although I did run into a wall this morning."

Hiro's voice was worried, "Are there any large bumps on your head?"

"No! I was joking..."

"Well…who are you talking about?"

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Shuichi ran out of the elevator and up to his apartment door, banging furiously on it. A startled looking Saki flung it open worriedly, but he just brushed by her, running into the kitchen.

"Do we have any posters of _all _of Bad Luck in here?"

The girl trailed nervously after him after locking the front door. She looked like she was torn between calling Mika and laughing at a really bad joke. At the question, the wrinkle in her forehead grew deeper, as her face portrayed pure confusion. "Um...yeah, in the spare room, but..."

Shuichi ripped open the door of the room, letting it bang against the wall hard. There, on the wall was an enormous life sized poster of Bad Luck, Hiro striking a dramatic guitar pose, as Shuichi gave a thumbs-up to the audience. And smack between them, grinning happily at the seat of the keyboard, was the friendly, green eyed face of Dyllon, waving at the crowd.

Where the hell was Suguru? How could he ever possibly have been replaced by this...this idiot? The singer knew that he wasn't being fair to Dyllon, but at the moment, he was slightly too enraged to care.

The dark haired boy was practically the best talent in NG records. No one, no one except Tohma could begin to rival his synthesizer skills, but somehow, staring down at him from this glossy picture, was the face of the blond man's boyfriend. And something was seriously wrong.

"Oh shit."

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Tohma paced his office, throwing occasion glances through the window at the fuming young man standing outside, who also seemed to be pacing rapidly. What was the singer doing here? As far as Tohma knew, Bad Luck didn't have a practice scheduled today, and hell would freeze over before Shuichi would come to work on a day off.

The boy seemed very upset, and Tohma didn't want to find out why. He'd heard enough stories about people who'd dealt with him at the wedding the day before, and truthfully he had no desire whatsoever to confront the singer, especially when he was in a mood like.

But eventually he'd have to deal with him, and better sooner than later, because he had to meet Dyllon for lunch, and there was no way he would ever get by Shuichi without talking to him.

Shaking his head, he took a deep breath to compose himself, and went over to open the door. The blond man, careful to keep his face cheerful, and particularly devoid of any annoyance, quirked an eyebrow in the singer's direction. "Yes?"

Instead of answering, Shuichi stormed his way into the room and threw himself into a chair. Then, he jumped up and began circling the room, darting extraordinarily dirty glances at Tohma. The accused merely went to sit in his chair, waiting for the singer to begin talking, which, after a period time he did.

"How could you do it?" Well, of all the things that Tohma had been expecting, this certainly wasn't one of them...what the hell was Shuichi accusing him of?

"Uh—"

"No, I just, I just can't handle this right now! How could you use Dyllon instead? Suguru was the most hardworking, talented person, and you just replace him with your _boyfriend_? That's just ridiculous! You're just—"

"—Now wait just a moment!" Tohma bellowed, scaring even himself for a second. A panicked look crossed the singer's face, then he seemed to deflate, folding into himself on a chair opposite the blond man's desk. More calmly, Tohma continued, "I've never replaced anyone from Bad Luck. Shuichi, I'm sorry, but I don't know what you're talking about, because it has only been you three from Day One...well, more like Day Five, because you were so goddamn stubborn about having another person, but..."

He trailed off as he analyzed the accusation. "Who are you talking about? Suguru? There's never been anyone who worked here by that name..."

"What? No, not...what?" Shuichi buried his hands in his head, horrific visions of a dead Suguru flying through his head. How had he messed up this time?

"Although," Tohma mused, almost to himself, "It's strange that you mention it, because I have a cousin named Suguru," Shuichi's heart jumped in hope, "Who used to be extremely good at keyboard...but I haven't seen him in years..."

"What?" the singer screeched indignantly, "I thought you practically brought him up!"

The look of surprise on Tohma's face was priceless. "What? No, I haven't seen him for...well, almost ten years. I went somewhere - with Eiri actually – and when I got back, I was so wrapped up in this new business, and...er...Dyllon...that I didn't really have time to spend with my family; I had better things to do." Shuichi gaped at him wordlessly. So _this_ was how it had all worked out. When Tohma had brought the damaged Eiri back to Japan, he'd probably realized how important his own family was, as he struggled to re-introduce Eiri to his.

The blond man, taking his expression to be shocked offence, plowed on, determined, for some reason unknown to him, to justify himself with this petulant young man. "Well, I was busy, and before I knew it, they told me not to come back, that I wasn't part of the family anymore. It's not as though they were saints either – my cousin's family were all messed up; begging me for money, living in scummy neighbourhoods, just generally not very nice people either. Except the boy," Tohma paused, remembering, "He was the only good one in the family...I suppose that I regret breaking ties with him, but it was necessary unfortunately. I would have taken him in too, but I had just moved in with Dyllon, and it would never have worked out..."

Shuichi leapt to his feet, mumbling an apology, and pulling Tohma out of his haze. Shocked at having told the boy so much, all he could do was sit there, contemplating his own words. The singer meanwhile, ran over to the wall and punched it once, and then again, harder.

Needless to say, this drew Tohma completely back to the present, and he ran over, intending to stop any more self (or wall) injury. But Shuichi had already collapsed to the floor, tears running down his face and his knees, which were curled up under his chin.

"I can't... I can't..." The singer was mumbling, "No more of this...it has to stop, please, it has to stop..."

"Shuichi?" Tohma bent down and put a wary hand on the boy's shoulder. "Are you—?"

"No! I'm not okay, stop asking for god's sake! I will never be okay again, not until you're married to Mika, and I've never heard of Dyllon, and Eiri and I—" He broke off, looking resolute.

He climbed to his feet, turning to Tohma with a glint in his eyes.

"Do you have an address?"

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Shuichi looked skeptically from the piece of paper clutched in his hands to the dilapidated house sitting in front of him. He could never, in his wildest dreams, imagine Suguru standing to live in a place like this. This keyboardist practically had a stroke every time there was a scrap of paper left on the ground...

Or maybe...this was why the dark haired boy was like that. Shuichi shuddered; even _he_ could never live in a dump like that! Gathering his courage, in a superbly superheroic moment, the singer puffed up his chest to look bigger, and strode purposely to the door. Just as his fingers hovered over the knocker in anticipation, the door was flung open in his face, knocking him backwards off the steps and back into the front yard.

"Oh." The lady responsible for the incident did not seemed particularly concerned by the person lying flat out on their back in front of her house. "Who're you?"

"Er," Shuichi murmered thickly through the stream of blood that was gushing from his nose, "Can I speak to Suguru?"

"Who're you?" The lady repeated, with the same exact monotone. As the singer climbed to his feet, he tried to repress a shudder at the sight of her: tangled, greasy hair, food on her face, dirt on her hands and all over her clothes, and a bruise covering the entire right side of her face. A half empty beer was shaking in her hands. The lady raised a dreary eyebrow at Shuichi's not-so-discreet examination of her, and then turned over her shoulder. "Brat! Where're you, stupid kid! Com're!" A high pitched shriek echoed through the yard and the singer winced, still nursing a throbbing head.

The lady stood at the door, glaring at him for a few minutes, then turned and said something to someone behind her. A low, famililar voice floated out to the yard, and Shuichi took at step towards the house eagerly. "Suguru!"

A barely quizzical head peered around the corner and stared at him. The lady laughed harshly, "I didn't know you had friends," she snorted, and saliva flew out her mouth, narrowly missing Suguru's head, "Who would want to put up with you if they didn't have to?"

The boy rolled his eyes and sent her a look of pure hate, then slowly ambled outside, keeping a wary eye on the singer as he approached. "Do I..." his voice was soft, as though it wasn't used a lot, "Do I know you?"

From the doorstep, the lady laughed again, "I knew he couldn't be your friend, you fucking brat, you don't have any...oh shit..." Swaying on her feet, she put out a hand to steady herself, but meeting only empty space, collapsed in a heap on the floor. Suguru sighed, and turned back to the house. Assuming that he was going to help her, he struggled to bite back a gasp as the teen merely slammed the door in front of her face, removing her from view.

Then, he wandered back to Shuichi. "Can I help you?"

"Er," the singer tried to get himself together after that display of motherly love, "My name is Shindou, uh, Shindou Shuichi, I'm from—"

"Bad Luck!" Suguru interrupted, showing the first signs of interest since he'd come to the door. "Oh my god, you're like...oh god..." An embarrassed look crossed his face, and he seemed to retreat into a shell again. "Sorry, I shouldn't be so...annoying..."

No, thought Shuichi, you should be the one with the fans. Somehow, he managed to drag a huge smile onto his face. "Actually, I really don't mind! Um..." he racked his brains for some way to introduce his idea, "Uh..."

The teen looked at him expectantly, possible signs of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. But a loud moaning noise came from inside the house, and it was replaced by a terrible scowl.

"Um, I know your cousin, Tohma?" Suguru's eyes lit up at the mention of the man, so he thought it was safe to continue. "He was telling me about you, and, um, I thought that you sounded like a great person, and I really wanted to meet you, and, uh, so here I am..."

"Is he here?" The teen burst out excitedly, craning to look around Shuichi.

"Oh, no...sorry, he was so busy today, that he couldn't...but..."

Suguru's face fell, but he nodded understandingly. "It's probably best. She'd kill 'em..." he shrugged a dismissive shoulder towards the house. Turning his attentions back to Shuichi, he realized for the first time that the singer was bleeding.

"Oh," he said, looking vaguely shocked. It seemed that he was back into a no-emotion mood, and the switching back and forth from excitement to hate to nothing was really creeping Shuichi out. "Here..." The teen dug into the shoulder bag that hung from his shoulder, until he produced a surprisingly clean hankerchief.

The singer looked dubiously between the cloth and the house, but taking into consideration the ridiculous neatness of the Suguru that he knew, he deemed it sanitary and pressed it up to his face. Suguru, who had been watching with bored, but calculating eyes, seemed to relax the tinest bit.

"Hey," Shuichi mumbled through the barrier, "Do you wanna go somewhere?"

The teen's eyes brightened a considerable amount. "Do I ever..."

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Shuichi sat across from the teen at a nearby café, tapping the table awkwardly. Since they'd gotten her, the boy hadn't said a thing, only studied the singer carefully, as if disbelieving that he was actually there. It was beginning to get scary, so Shuichi attempted to start a conversation.

"So, um, how well do you know Tohma?"

Suguru blinked in surprise, and then re-focused his attention. "Oh, not very well, anymore."

"Anymore?"

"Well, when I was a kid he used to come over and give me piano lessons, but then he just stopped coming. I think that bitch asked him for money one too many times," An unfamiliar smirk crossed the teen's face, and he screwed up his face unattractively, "Yeah, probably...but it was too bad, cuz I was really good, at piano I mean..." Shuichi couldn't keep a smile off of his face as a glimpse of the normal Suguru came out.

They fell silent for a moment, and then to the singer's surprise, Suguru started talking, as he was rummaging through his bag. "Um, it's okay if you don't want...um, but um," Shuichi's heart almost broke at the sight of the teen being so unsure. His Suguru had so much confidence, he reflected, especially for a sixteen-year-old. Must come from living with Tohma for such a long time...

"Can I have your autograph," the words tumbled awkwardly out of his mouth, and then Suguru's cheeks reddened, "Please?" he added, hopefully.

Shuichi squirmed at the strangeness of it all. Usually, this young man would be sitting in front of him, yelling at him to stop crying, or to get to work, but now, he was reduced to a half-eager, half-embarrased teen who actually wanted the singer's autograph. It was Shuichi's turn to blush, as he thought about just how much he'd screwed up this time, and in that instant, knew what he had to do.

"Can I tell you something?" Shuichi asked, as he quickly scribbled down a message, and his signature on a scrap piece of paper for the boy, who was trying so hard not to smile.

Suguru nodded his head eagerly, but then stopped himself, and gave a slightly more dignified inclination of agreement.

"I've messed up..." It was time to confess; he needed to tell someone the story so bad, just to hear from someone else that he had really fucked things over this time, "I was only trying to help, but everything just got out of hand..." he looked up from the table to see Suguru's curious eyes peeking out from an errant stray of black hair. This was all the encouragement that he needed...

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Finally, the story all came out, every last detail if it, down to the very last expression on people's faces as he had run wild with their lives. Shuichi spent the entire time looking down at his fingers, twisting nervously in between themselves, but there was no doubt that the teen was listening. The feeling of his glare bore into the top of the singer's head, giving him yet another reason to remain with his head bowed.

As he recounted the last part; where he had met Tohma in the office, he heard Suguru's sharp intake of breath, and the grinding noise that was coming from his teeth. Too afraid to meet the teen's eyes, he instead glanced over his hands, which were clenched angrily against the side of the table.

Immediately, he regretted his decision to tell it to such an unstable teenager. Clearly, Suguru was not mentally equipped to deal with something like this.

"I'm...I'm sorry, I shouldn't have told you...it wasn't..."

"Who do you think you are?" came a whisper from the other side of the table, "Why are you doing this to me?"

Shuichi's heart sunk. This wasn't quite what he was expecting, but he should have known better, should have known that he would get a reaction like this.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't...shouldn't..." his voice trailed off uncertainly; repeating himself wasn't going to help at all. Tears began to fill his eyes, but he desperately wiped at them, not willing for the Suguru, who had so much more to cry for, to see them.

The boy stared at him in disgust.

"Who do you think you are, to come in here and tell me this?" He stood up, eyes blazing with anger. "How can you fucking tell me that this, this is your fault?" The teen ripped back his sleeves, exposing red, deeply scarred wrists to a shocked Shuichi. Some of the cuts seemed quite recent.

"I...I'm...I'm sorry...I..."

"Yeah, that's right, you're sorry. Sorry that playing god has ruined my life. You're sorry that I _used_ to be happy, but thanks to you, because your _boyfriend_ wasn't _nice_ to you, I'm fucking...like this!" Suguru waved his arms in the singer's face.

Shuichi's eyes spilled over. "I can...I can fix this, it's okay...I can—"

"No! You can't. And I don't want you to. God" he shook his head, frustrated, " Can't you see that with all your fucking meddling, I'll probably be _dead_ next time!"

The angry teen flung down the piece of paper with Shuichi's signature onto the table, crumpled into a ball.

"I hope that we never meet again," he hissed, and then stalked out of the café.

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Shuichi dragged himself onto a park bench, ignoring the strange stares that he was getting from all the people walking by. With the blood still trickling out of his nose now and then, and the tears staining his face, he probably looked half-dead. He should be dead.

What had he been thinking? Each time, things just got worse, and each time, he never learned his lesson. Each time, he continued to try and change things, try to mold his life to this perfect vision. Well, as he was now realizing, perfect for him did _not_ mean perfect for anybody else. God, he was so selfish.

There had to be a way to get everything back to normal, without messing anything back up. Without going back to New York, because god knew that that just never turned out right. He wasn't strong enough to stand by and watch Eiri walk by, so happy, so soon to be the bitter young man that would become his boyfriend ten years in the future.

He threw his head into his hands, groaning.

"Do you understand now?" Looking up, he saw the familiar sight of that boy, sitting on the bench morosely. "Do you?" There was an unreadable expression on his face that was scaring the singer. It almost reminded him of the look on Suguru's face only an hour earlier, which only provided more motivation from him to answer correctly.

Shuichi nodded frantically. "Yes, I understand; I can't be god! Just please, please, can you fix this? I just want everything back to normal...please?"

The boy shook his head, "No, I can't fix it." He paused. Shuichi's face fell. Everything was over; he couldn't live with himself like this, knowing that he'd caused such anguish in so many of his friends' lives. But seeing the crushed expression on the singer's face, the boy continued, "But you can. I'll take you back, but it's up to you to make it right again."

Bringing his face up to his hands, Shuichi moaned in protest. "I can't! I've tried, and I always ruin things even more. Please, can't you do it yourself?" Bad things happened when he tried to help. It was a proven fact, so why did the boy want him to even attempt a rescue?

"No! You have to do it. It's your responsibility, now go." With that, the park scene faded from around them – which was unusual, considering it seemed to, in the past times, have come in a great flash. The boy saw him looking around, and smiled wearily. "I'm tired; I don't have enough energy to keep this up. I don't think that I'll be able to help if you mess up again...so don't."

"But—" The boy had already disappeared, leaving Shuichi standing right beside the building, watching himself watch the boy walk over to his even earlier self and convince him to walk away. Phew, his head was reeling at the thought. But...was that what he had to do? Convince himself to walk away? Would it even work?

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Shuichi perked up from his perch behind a building; the noises of the three men came around the corner, and he watched nervously as they entered the building, laughing lewdly at each other. Disgusting pigs; he'd like to— no, he wasn't going to think like that. He couldn't get involved this time, in fact, he had to un-involve himself somehow.

He saw himself begin to creep towards the building. Now was the time; he slowly stepped out of his hiding spot, and walked over to the Shuichi that was about to run into the building after those three men. What was he going to say to make himself understand? What could he do?

But without saying anything, that Shuichi seemed to sense him, and turned around. His eyes widened enormously at the sight, his mouth gaping open.

Shuichi stood there, staring himself straight in the eyes, giving him a good look at his horrifying appearance – covered in his own blood, tears streaking through a mixture of sweat, dirt and blood on his cheeks, and dripping down his chin to the ground. Then he shook his head just once. The other Shuichi understood immediately. He nodded his head solemnly, and turned towards the street, not even voicing an argument against his clearly more knowledgeable self. It made him proud to know that he could react so calmly in a situation like that.

A voice floated around his head. "That's better..." As he turned to look at the boy, everything slowly faded to black.

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Shuichi bolted upright in the couch, looking around him everywhere for the boy. Where he finally decided that the room was empty, he looked up at the clock. 3 a.m. Was everything back to normal again? It looked like he was in Eiri's apartment, but experience had taught him other.

Afraid to get up, he remained sitting on the couch, at first too caught up from the sound of his own breath echoing in his eyes to hear the familiar sounds of typing coming from the room straight across from the couch.

The singer inhaled deeply and held it, not quite believing his ears. Crossing his fingers behind his back, he slowly tiptoed over to the office, and peered in the doors.

It was...Eiri. Just as he'd left him, working to finish his novel by yet another upcoming deadline. Tears began to stream down his face again, this time in happiness. They joined, and washed away the sorrowful tears from earlier. Was this real? It had to be; he couldn't handle any more meddling...

Just to make sure, Shuichi gathered a handful of skin and pinched himself sharply. "Ow!" he hissed, wrongly estimating how much it would hurt. With a sigh from inside the room, the typing stopped, and Eiri heaved himself to his feet wearily.

"What is it brat? I'm really busy right now..." Shuichi smiled to hear the familiar grumpy words from his boyfriend's mouth. It was ironic how happy they made him, considering he should probably be cowering and whining by now.

"I just wanted to see you," the singer skipped lightly into the room, breathing in the smell of Eiri in his element. Walking shyly up to the writer, Shuichi leaned in and kissed him chastely on the cheek, grinning once again at the wonderful scent wafting from the author. "I love you Eiri," he said simply, and then walked from the room.

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Shuichi slipped into his boxers, stripped off his shirt, and crawled into the bed, sighing softly at its lovely familiarness. Everything was so much better than he remembered it, because it was his. It was his bed, his Eiri, his life. There was nothing that he'd do to change it now.

The door opened quietly, and Eiri slipped in, shed his clothes, and slipped under the sheets beside the singer. Most likely thinking that his boyfriend was asleep, the writer leaned over and planted a soft kiss on Shuichi's shoulder, draping a possessive arm over the singer's waist.

Shuichi grinned widely. Okay, now there was nothing that he'd change.

The END!

**Author's (Final) Note: ** Yay, it's done! Phew, that was quite the nagging at my conscience... so, I'm sorry that the ending is so anti-climatic, but it was my favourite of all the possiblities that I entertained...Anyways, read, review, go on with your lives! Thanks for all the support from my WONDERFUL reviewers, to everyone who reviewed, especially love-ly-meow for reviewing every chapter so far :P


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